Austin was honest, says former minister

FORMER Fine Gael minister Sean Barrett told the Moriarty Tribunal yesterday he considered businessman David Austin, who handled a controversial $50,000 Telenor/Esat Telecom donation to the party, to be an honest man.

A senior Jefferson Smurfit executive and FG fundraiser, the late Mr Austin had offered the money as a personal donation in the run-up to the 1997 General Election.

Then Taoiseach John Bruton had rejected the money some time previously on discovering its connection to the Norwegian/Irish consortium that won the competition for the country’s second mobile phone licence in October 1995.

“My experience of David Austin was that he was an extremely honest man, who wouldn’t have been involved in any wrongdoing in that respect,” Mr Barrett said.

Agreeing with tribunal lawyer Jacqueline O’Brien BL that here Mr Austin had adopted an unorthodox way of party fundraising, Mr Barrett said probably the right thing would have been to return the cash.

He also agreed the false Telenor invoice raised to cover the donation was unorthodox. When Eoghan Fitzsimons SC, for Telenor, suggested a lot of political parties were raising funds that way then, Mr Barrett said it wasn’t the first time it was done.

Former FG employee Daniel Egan was asked to advise Esat Telecom founder Denis O'Brien on how to raise his and his company’s public profiles after an approach by the late FG deputy Jim Mitchell, who was then an Esat consultant.

An adviser to John Bruton when he was Minister for Finance, Mr Egan told Mr O’Brien to develop a relationship with members of the political establishment, to attend fundraising events run by various political parties and that it would not be wise to be identified with one party.

“The aim of the exercise was to project Esat as a serious contender for the new (GSM2) licence.

"Building a strong public profile for Esat during the tender process period would also have significant marketing benefits if the company was successful in obtaining the licence,” he said, adding that he didn't know that in a 15-month period Mr O'Brien had also donated £22,400 (€28,442) to FG.

Danish consultant Michael Andersen, who helped civil servants select the Esat consortium to run the second mobile phone licence, may give evidence to the tribunal in the coming months after a breakthrough in a legal dispute with the owners of his Copenhagen-based former firm.

Mr Andersen is currently in arbitration with Andersen Management International's new owners tribunal lawyer Jerry Healy SC announced yesterday.

The tribunal adjourned until Tuesday when it is expected to begin hearing evidence from other licence bidders.