Analysis:A payment to Bertie Ahern was recorded as a contribution to his constituency operation, writes Colm Keena.
The very sensitive position occupied by Des Richardson in the background of Irish public life was at the core of yesterday's hearing.
A long-time friend and associate of Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, Richardson was one of the small number of men who acted as trustees when St Luke's in Drumcondra was purchased in 1988, for use as Ahern's political base. The property is held on behalf of the O'Donovan Rossa cumann, in Ahern's constituency, the tribunal heard.
In the early 1990s, Richardson was asked by Ahern, who was party treasurer, to become Fianna Fáil's chief political fundraiser, with the object of reducing the party's then £3 million debt.
Richardson operated separately from the party operation in Mount Street, taking out offices in the Berkeley Court Hotel in Ballsbridge. He lodged the money raised to the Fianna Fáil account, lodging £50,000 in November 1993, and £100,000 the following month.
At the same time as he was reducing the party debt, he was also a member of a committee that each year raised in the region of £30,000 to £35,000 for the O'Donovan Rossa cumann, by way of an annual dinner in Kilmainham.
And then, in and around December 1993, he says he became involved in an effort to raise in the region of £20,000 for Ahern personally, this suggestion coming from the late Gerard Brennan. Brennan was a close friend of Richardson, and a friend and solicitor to Ahern. The money was to help Ahern settle legal fees arising from his separation proceedings.
Obviously it was essential for Richardson not to allow his three fundraising roles to become confused or intertwined in any way, something he acknowledged yesterday. The evidence heard did not show any funds being diverted from one purpose towards another, though a book-keeping entry in the cheque journal of a company called Willdover, which Richardson controlled, incorrectly recorded a personal payment of £2,500 to Ahern as being expenditure linked to the 1993 dinner in Kilmainham.
In another entry in the company's books, the same payment was recorded as being linked to a "promotional outlay". Richardson said the money in Willdover was his money, and he was entitled to give some to a friend if he wanted.The company was used by Richardson to invoice Fianna Fáil for the fundraising services he was providing.
The money Richardson says he and Brennan collected in December 1993 was handed to Ahern in his office in St Luke's on December 27th.
Although Richardson said he asked the other donors to make their contributions by way of cash, for confidentiality reasons, he made his own contribution by way of a cheque from Willdover.
Of the £22,500 subsequently lodged by Ahern to his bank, £15,000 was in cash. During the course of his questioning yesterday, Des O'Neill SC, for the tribunal, remarked that no contemporaneous document had been found recording the cash payments, or evidencing the cash being withdrawn from any of the donors' accounts.
The non-cash element of the lodgement comprised a cheque for £2,500 made out to cash, from Willdover, and a draft for £5,000 made out to Richardson. Copies of these were retrieved from the archives of Ahern's bank. The tribunal has already heard that the draft was purchased with a cheque from NCB, and that the then managing director of NCB, Padraic O'Connor, has told the tribunal in private session that he did not intend the money, which he gave to Richardson, as a payment to Ahern personally but rather as a contribution towards Ahern's constituency operation.