Taxpayers may face huge bill over tribunal findings

TAXPAYERS face having to fork out hundreds of millions of euro in compensation after billionaire Denis O’Brien yesterday claimed a tribunal will rule he was awarded a mobile phone contract “illegally”.

Persona, the rival bidders for the lucrative licence given to Mr O’Brien’s Esat consortium in the 1990s, seem poised to sue the State for massive damages if the Moriarty tribunal finds there was wrong-doing in the process to hand out the contract.

However, Labour insisted that if any parties were found to have acted illegally by the tribunal, it should be them and not the taxpayer who footed any subsequent compensation bills arising from that.