Ahern ‘changed mind’ on Liffey Valley

HAVING accepted an invitation several months earlier, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern changed his mind about performing the opening of the Liffey Valley shopping centre in 1998, the Mahon Tribunal heard yesterday.

Tribunal lawyer Patricia Dillon SC, suggested to former lobbyist Frank Dunlop that the tribunal’s investigation had by then turned the whole Quarryvale development — on which the west Dublin shopping centre was built — into “a political hot potato”.

In May 1998, Mr Ahern’s office said the Taoiseach had agreed to do this function, which was then scheduled for October 19. But to suit the Duke of Westminster, who owned part of the west Dublin site, the opening was delayed until November.