Further tales in the fall and fall of Foley

WHEN Denis Foley’s name appeared in Revenue’s list of settlements made by tax defaulters there was an air of inevitability to it; almost weariness.

It's a long time since Foley was first named and shamed, five years in fact since the Moriarty Tribunal first disclosed the former Kerry North TD's "uisce faoi thalamh".

The revelation was dramatic then, made especially so because he was the deputy chairman of the Dáil's Public Accounts Committee. He had also voted unblinkingly in the Dáil to set up the McCracken and Moriarty Tribunals, the inquiries which would ensnare him.

Not alone was he the holder of an infamous offshore Ansbacher account with deposits of £133,000, he admitted he had known about it since 1983.

When the heat came on and all the dirty doings came to light, he admitted to Moriarty he had sat on his hands, had not come forward, hopelessly wished that it would somehow go away.

Foley wasn't the biggest fish swimming around in these murky waters. His dishonesty was eclipsed by fellow Fianna Fáil snafflers like Liam Lawlor, Ray Burke and, of course, CJH himself.

Still, he was put through the ringers over the next two years. The Revenue was immediately on his case he quickly made a £50,000 (€63,000) payment.

He resigned from the PAC and from the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party. Later, he was suspended from the Dáil for 14 days for seven breaches of the Ethics in Public Office Act.

In September 2000, he announced that he would stand down at the next election.

In an interview he gave that day, he had a bitter parting shot for the media, alleging overkill.

"That was money I accrued over a period of 17 years due to hard work. I got no brown envelopes during the period of time," he railed.

No, but he also conveniently forgot to pay tax on his hard earnings and arranged for it to be secreted in a dodgy offshore scheme in the Cayman Islands.

In the end, he paid dearly for it the €580,000 settlement included almost €400,000 in interest and penalties.

Foley didn't quite measure up to the image of an Ansbacher account holder as projected by the likes of Haughey, Kerry-born dance-hall magnate John Byrne and the other suave captains of industry inducted into Ansbacher by accountant Des Traynor.

Foley cut a somewhat ascetic image.

With his sober suits, his pioneer pin and Brylcreem-slicked air, his conservative appearance dovetailed with ultra conservative views on abortion and divorce.

Publicly, Foley lived a modest life. However, the lucre started rolling in during the 1960s, helped initially through his friendship with Byrne. When Byrne built the Mount Brandon Hotel in Tralee, Foley became the booking agent for its ballroom. It was during the height of the showband era and there was money to be made.

He knew Traynor through his audit work for the Brandon Hotel and in the mid 1970s, Mr Haughey's money man secured a "good arrangement" for him through Guinness & Mahon bank.

And in 1979, £50,000 a small fortune found its way to Ansbacher.

His Oireachtas career, when viewed in retrospect, was unspectacular to say the least. And his demise had the effect of kiboshing the Dáil ambitions of his highly regarded daughter Norma.

To compound his misery, it was the son of his constituency arch-rival, Tom McEllistrim junior, who eventually won the only FF seat in the constituency.