‘Wrong people’ probing Siteserv sell-off

Government moves to appoint a former High Court judge to oversee the Siteserv probe prove the wrong people are carrying out the investigation, opposition TDs have warned.

Finance Minister Michael Noonan attempted to allay concern that KPMG would be handling the review — despite it being involved in the controversial sale of the firm by former Anglo bank IBRC — by appointing retired High Court Judge Justice Iarfhlaith O’Neill to check for “any actual or perceived conflicts of interests”.

However, rather than defuse the row, the move was seen by opposition TDs as confirmation that the probe into IBRC sales, which lost the taxpayer at least €10m, could be compromised.

“They are appointing a former judge to make sure the people carrying out the inquiry do not show a conflict of interest,” said Independent Wicklow TD Stephen Donnelly. “Why not just let someone without any perceived conflict of interest do it? The appointment of a former judge clearly acknowledges that there is at least a potential conflict of interest here. Why let a company involved in the process investigate that process?”

The review covers IBRC deals from its nationalisation in January 2009 to its liquidation, handled by KPMG, in February 2013, and follows controversy stemming from freedom of information documents that showed civil servants raised repeated, serious concerns about the sale of Siteserv to a company controlled by Denis O’Brien.

The deal lost the taxpayer €105m — €5m of which went to shareholders in the bankrupt firm to ensure their approval. A subsidiary of the company was then given a lucrative contract to install water meters. Mr Donnelly demanded to know if Mr Noonan had told the Taoiseach and the Cabinet about the strong civil service concerns at the time of the sale.

“We need to know if he told Enda Kenny and fellow ministers and, if he did, when, because the only indication we had from him regarding the concern of civil servants came when he knew the information was to be released under freedom of information,” Mr Donnelly said.

The review was flawed from the off, said Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin.

“This an extremely weak attempt by Government to give the impression of an inquiry while avoiding any real independent investigation into the very serious questions surrounding the sale of Siteserv,” said Mr Martin.

“The appointment of a judge to merely ‘monitor certain transactions’ at the IBRC does not go nearly far enough. The terms of reference are far too narrow. The only way to find out exactly what happened is to establish a commission of investigation without further delay.”

The row came as the register of shareholders when Siteserv was sold was made available to journalists under very strict conditions. The move came after concern about a surge in share dealing in the months before the sale of the insolvent company in March, 2012.

However, much of the holdings were not listed to individuals, but financial firms acting on behalf of unnamed people. One holding appeared to go from 2.5m shares to 4.8m shares in a two-month period. The finance minister said the probe would get to the truth.

“The purpose of this review is to determine whether there is evidence of material deficiencies in IBRC’s performance in respect of such transactions and related activities and management decisions, and whether it can be concluded that the transactions were not commercially sound,” Mr Noonan said.

After former IBRC chairman and ex-Fine Gael leader Alan Dukes said he was “scandalised” that Mr Noonan had asked the review to look for evidence of criminality and malpractice in the bank’s transactions, Mr Noonan said he did not assume any wrongdoing had occurred, but the review would have to look into that.

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