Callely: I’ll pay up if I broke rules on expenses

SENATOR Ivor Callely has insisted he did not break any expenses rules — but vowed to cough up the money if he was proved wrong.

At a public Seanad meeting over his €81,000 travel and overnight claims, the ex-Dublin North Central TD said he had moved to his Cork home in 2007 after the shock of losing his Dáil position.

The Fianna Fáil senator, who resigned as junior transport minister in 2005 following controversy over renovations on his Clontarf property, said the scandal and subsequent loss of his seat had been a traumatic experience. He said he moved to Bantry following the “traumatic” loss of his Dáil seat.

He said of his decision to base himself in West Cork: “I feel this was the right place for me to deal with the ongoing trauma I was experiencing.”

Mr Callely claimed expenses from Kilcrohane for August 2007 to the end of that year and for the first eight months of both 2008 and 2009.

Asked why he did not claim in the last four months of either year, he said it was to reflect the fact that he began spending more time in Dublin “due to changing personal and domestic circumstances” and increased political campaigning.

He also told the committee how in mid-2009 he had contacted the Oireachtas with a view to restoring Clontarf as his principal residence, but was unable to.

Yet when asked to declare his address for this year he chose Kilcrohane and has claimed expenses from there for January and February.

However, he has requested that these expenses be “parked” until the issue is resolved, and has similarly not cashed cheques received since March when a new expenses system was introduced.

Mr Callely said he had been ‘open and honest’ about his expenses and said the expenses system contained a number of anomalies.

The committee heard he paid the second home property tax on his house in Clontarf. He explained that he makes himself visible and does not hide himself when in Dublin, but he said that he is also seen walking his dog in west Cork.

The maximum penalty Mr Callely faces should things go against him is a month’s suspension.

Senators Joe O’Toole, Alex White and Denis O’Donovan of Fianna Fáil led the questioning of Mr Callely, who maintained if he had over-claimed his expenses it had been totally unintentional and if that was shown he would reimburse any money.