Mahon Tribunal report

THE Irish Examiner published an article on Wednesday, October 18, under the headline "'Bertie took payment when tax bid was already blocked'".

The article was a report of the previous day’s proceedings at the Mahon Tribunal which was concerned largely with the evidence of a former Principal Officer at the Dept of Finance, Liam Murphy.

The Irish Examiner report pointed out, in the first paragraph of the article, that "Mr Liam Murphy had told the Tribunal that a special tax status for Blanchardstown Shopping Centre had been ruled out in 1990, three years before An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern allegedly received £30,000 for blocking the centre’s bid".

The report goes on to say, in the second paragraph, that "a tax designation for Blanchardstown Shopping Centre in West Dublin was always off the agenda".

Solicitors acting on behalf of An Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, have suggested

that the use of quotations in the headline implied that the headline was an actual quotation from the evidence given by Mr Murphy.

The Irish Examiner would like to acknowledge that the headline was not a direct quote from the evidence given on that day and did not properly reflect the contents of the story as published.