Healy-Rae ‘vindicated after slurs’

A BITTER exchange took place at a meeting of Kerry County Council, with Cllr Danny Healy-Rae claiming that another councillor tried to “cast slurs” on his character arising from his plant hire business.

The issue arose following a call at a previous meeting by Cllr Brendan Cronin for details of sums earned by contractors working for the council.

It emerged Mr Danny Healy-Rae was the highest paid contractor, earning €401,283 as a contractor from the council, last year.

Mr Cronin also asked for senior counsel’s opinion on whether there was a conflict of interest between a member of the authority connected to a plant hire firm being involved in work for the council.

Senior counsel Esmonde Keane has now given the opinion that a county councillor should not have to absent himself from roads and sanitary services meetings in which he had only a minor, beneficial interest.

In particular, he should not have to leave meetings where the overall budget had been decided upon already and the only maters were the schemes to be proceeded with, even if he was on the list of approved contractors.

Mr Keane said the member’s interest, even if he were a plant hire contractor, would be remote and insignificant in the context of schemes where the overall budget was already decided.

Mr Healy-Rae said he had been “100% vindicated” and that Mr Cronin was trying to cast aspersions on him for political gain. “He tried to hurt me publicly while trying to further himself,” Mr Healy-Rae declared.

He said he never took part in discussions at any meeting about the type of machinery to be hired for road works and Mr Cronin had failed miserably in his efforts.

Mr Cronin, however, said he had a right to ask questions about the spending of public money and would continue to ask such questions. “How public money is spent is very crucial to political life at the present time,” he added.