Fahey accused of assaulting committee member

FORMER junior minister Frank Fahey has been accused of assaulting a member of the Oireachtas agriculture committee to protect his reputation.

The incident is alleged to have happened because the unnamed member criticised Mr Fahey’s role as champion of the maligned Lost at Sea scheme.

Fine Gael TD Tom Sheahan said Fianna Fáil’s attempts to thwart discussion on the scheme were driven by Mr Fahey’s anger at how it had been assessed by the Ombudsman, Emily O’Reilly.

He told Ms O’Reilly that Mr Fahey had been heavy-handed in dealing with Dáil colleagues who probed the issues raised in her report.

“I can personally state that Deputy Fahey not only abused, attacked, and threatened members of the House regarding this scheme, regarding your report, and everything we may have to say regarding [the report],” he said.

Mr Sheahan made the allegations at the Oireachtas agriculture committee using special legal privilege afforded to deputies and senators. He said Mr Fahey assaulted one of the 16 members of the Agriculture committee.

A statement on behalf of Mr Fahey said he rejected the allegations. “It is just another false allegation made by Fine Gael in relation to the scheme and his [Mr Fahey’s] involvement in the scheme.”

He will appear before the committee next week to clarify issues surrounding Ms O’Reilly’s report.

The chair of yesterday’s committee session, Fianna Fáil deputy Bobby Aylward, asked Mr Sheahan to withdraw the comments. He said the Kerry South deputy should wait until Mr Fahey was present before making such claims.

“Be careful. I just say that, as chairman, we are straying into very uncharted waters here by making allegations of that type.”

His party colleague, Mattie McGrath, said if Mr Sheahan had knowledge of an assault he should report it to the Gardaí.