Lowry met phone licence bidders against advice of staff

FORMER Communications Minister Michael Lowry has admitted he ignored the advice of his senior civil servants in agreeing to meet businessmen involved in bidding for the State’s second mobile phone licence during 1995.

The Tipperary North TD also accused the chief executive of Independent News & Media, Tony O’Reilly, yesterday of having a “faulty” recollection over an allegation that he had informed the millionaire businessman how his bid for licence was performing.

Mr Lowry told the Moriarty Tribunal yesterday that he had been advised by his department’s secretary-general, John Loughrey that it would be preferable if he didn’t meet any of the applicants for the licence.

The inquiry is investigating the circumstances surrounding the awarding of the lucrative mobile phone licence to the Esat consortium headed by Denis O’Brien. The competition was assessed by civil servants who made a final recommendation to Mr Lowry in October 1995.

Mr Lowry said he did not regard the advice as practical as it was inevitable that he would come into contact with people involved in the bidding consortia. “As I was outside the project team, I felt as a politician, that it was absolutely essential to meet them,” he remarked.

Mr Lowry said he always aimed to give the clear message that as minister he would not choose the successful applicant.

The tribunal has heard that Mr Lowry met both Mr O’Brien and Tony Boyle, the chief executive of a rival consortium, Persona, unknown to his departmental staff during the time of the application process.

The former Fine Gael minister, said he had met Mr Boyle in the Killiney Castle Hotel as a matter of courtesy. He had also met Mr O’Brien in a pub on Lower Lesson Street in Dublin after the All-Ireland football final in September 1995. Mr Lowry said it was a social occasion and he stopped the conversation when Mr O’Brien tried to “moan about” his department’s regulatory division.

Despite being the subject of innuendo for the past 10 years Mr Lowry said any suggestion he had deliberately halted the licence process (due to concerns voiced by the European Commission) to favour Mr O’Brien was “total nonsense”.

Meanwhile, Mr Lowry said Dr O’Reilly was inaccurate to claim that he (Lowry) had made a remark when the two men met in Galmoy, Co Kilkenny in September 1995 that the consortium in which the Independent group was involved had not done well in an oral presentation to the licence project team.

Mr Lowry said he could not have conveyed such information to Dr O’Reilly as he was unaware of the matter himself.

According to Dr O’Reilly, Mr Lowry had observed: “Your fellas didn’t do too well yesterday.”

The politician said Dr O’Reilly’s recollection was “faulty”.

Contrary to the businessman’s evidence, Mr Lowry said the pair had first met during the 1995 Derby at the Curragh. The Independent boss had criticised FG for joining Labour in a coalition government and not calling a general election. Mr Lowry said Dr O’Reilly had also commented that Fianna Fáil was also better for controlling Labour in government.