Bertie Ahern helped businessman get passport

[pete]

RTE: Ahern helped businessman get passport
(http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0130/ahernb.html)



It has been confirmed tonight that Bertie Ahern assisted Manchester businessman Norman Turner in receiving a passport in 1994.

Mr Turner - who donated money to Fianna Fáil - was at the centre of a proposal to build a controversial casino in the Phoenix Park in the same year.

Tonight a spokesperson for Mr Ahern said the suggestion that the facilitation of this passport was inappropriate was 'totally mischevious' He pointed out that Norman Turner's mother was born in Cork and as such Mr Turner was entitled to a passport.

Late last year the Fianna Fáil fundraiser and close colleague of Bertie Ahern, Des Richardson, told the Mahon Tribunal that Mr Turner had given $10,000 in cash around April or May 1994 for Fianna Fáil.


If this person had an Irish mother why did he need assistance from Minister Ahern? :rolleyes:

How long can FF support him? I don't many people believe he is a crook but it is harder to believe his innocence.

[Bald Student]

If this person had an Irish mother why did he need assistance from Minister Ahern? :rolleyes:That's not unusual, my local county councilor registered me to vote. Politicians do a lot of this type of work.

[GavinZac]

If this person had an Irish mother why did he need assistance from Minister Ahern? :rolleyes:

How long can FF support him? I don't many people believe he is a crook but it is harder to believe his innocence.
If it transpires that Mrs Turner is an Irish citizen will you withdraw your insults?

If my car was giving me trouble I'd ask a mechanic friend to help. What would you do if you wanted to get a passport you were entitled to, and a friend of yours was in the public service?

[osarusan]

If my car was giving me trouble I'd ask a mechanic friend to help. What would you do if you wanted to get a passport you were entitled to, and a friend of yours was in the public service?

Obviously first of all, I'd donate 10,000 dollars to his political party, as is the rule in Ireland, then I'd go and get the passport I'm already entitled to.

[GavinZac]

Obviously first of all, I'd donate 10,000 dollars to his political party, as is the rule in Ireland, then I'd go and get the passport I'm already entitled to.
The high-flying business type's equivalent of buying him a pint in the local later? ;)

Clearly however one could insinuate that the businessman, by donating to a political party governing a country he neither had financial stakes in nor lived in the jurisdiction of, was trying to get an advantage in... er...

[osarusan]

Clearly however one could insinuate that the businessman, by donating to a political party governing a country he neither had financial stakes in nor lived in the jurisdiction of, was trying to get an advantage regarding the awarding of permission to build a controversial casino in the Phoenix Park

Got it in one Gavin:D

But seriously, it seems the donation itself is not disputed. Now your original point (which I so wittily altered) remains - why would a businessman donate to a political party governing a country he neither had financial stakes in nor lived in the jurisdiction of?

to be honest, 18 years later, I couldn't care less.

[GavinZac]

Do finance ministers have to sign off on planning permission these days? Bloody bureaucracy, eh?

[Ringo]

That's not unusual, my local county councilor registered me to vote. Politicians do a lot of this type of work.
http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0130/ahernb.html
Tonight a spokesperson for Mr Ahern said the suggestion that the facilitation of this passport was inappropriate was 'totally mischevious'

He pointed out that Norman Turner's mother was born in Cork and as such Mr Turner was entitled to a passport.

And he said in 2007, 6,000 passport applications were processed in this way - through the intervention of Oireachtas members.


this is just Fine Gael being silly:rolleyes:

[Lionel Ritchie]

I'm inclined to agree. Bertie is as bent as a hairpin but, in this instance, there's nothing to see here.

[Ash]

What would you do if you wanted to get a passport
you were entitled to, and a friend of yours was in the public service?

I'd ask him to pick up an application form for me on his way home from work.

Big difference between getting a passport and getting a car fixed.
To fix a car your entitled to have fixed, you bring it to a qualified mechanic.

To apply for a passport your already entitled to you dont have to give
10k to the Minister for Finance to lodge in his account. Ooops, sorry, sure
he didnt have a bank account.

[noby]

Well, people are focusing on the passport thing, but surely this is the main point:

He said this was serious and significant new information that indicates that Mr Turner had a closer relationship with the Taoiseach than previously admitted.

It suits FF to focus on the passport, but surely Ahern doesn't help out every stranger he meets with their application. It still mightn't amount to a hill of beans, though.

[jebus]

Not much to whip Bertie with here I feel, shame, given how much of a lying, thieving scumbag he is

[anto1208]

Id be less worried about passports and dodgy money being paid to him and more about why he is taking time off his job and charging 3 grand to open places like pubs and shops etc during the day.

You would never see george bush or Gordon Brown cuttign the ribbon on some off licence in the middle of no where.

All polititians are dodgy it doesnt take a tribunal and 350 mill to find that out.

Watching the new TV 3 show last night they had a FF guy on and the presenter asked him " do you believe that Berties Lawyer who had intimate knowledge of his account and who knew his had 73 grand in savings really organised a whip around to pay his 17grand legal bill from the seperation because he was hard up at the time" ?

Your man said yes :D

Who keeps electing these idiots ......oh ya bigger idiots

[GavinZac]

I'd ask him to pick up an application form for me on his way home from work.Bit hard to pick it up on the way from work in Manchester, but if Bertie is bringing it over, you'd think he'd put in a good word for him aswell at the same time given that...

And he said in 2007, 6,000 passport applications were processed in this way - through the intervention of Oireachtas members.

To apply for a passport your already entitled to you dont have to give
10k to the Minister for Finance to lodge in his account. Ooops, sorry, sure
he didnt have a bank account.the donation was specifically to FIne Fail, which would be the obvious option to thank someone like Bertie without implicating him in anything.

The smearing is getting pathetic at this point. Let the tribunal take its course, should a bombshell be dropped, wait for the tribunal to make its recommendation and then say farewell to Bertie. If the tribunal do not find that there was dodgy dealings between himself and Owen O'Callaghan, shut the hell up and get on with doing some damn work to run our country instead of wasting petty point scoring which didnt work before the election and wont work for the next one.

[jebus]

The smearing is getting pathetic at this point. Let the tribunal take its course, should a bombshell be dropped, wait for the tribunal to make its recommendation and then say farewell to Bertie. If the tribunal do not find that there was dodgy dealings between himself and Owen O'Callaghan, shut the hell up and get on with doing some damn work to run our country instead of wasting petty point scoring which didnt work before the election and wont work for the next one.

And if the tribunal pass something along the lines of the Michael Jackson 'not innocent, but can't be proven guilty' verdict what then? Can we never use the no bank account, different versions of events, overall El Tel style dealings against Bertie again?

[monutdfc]

The donation was allegedly specifically to Fianna Fáil (I say allegedly because Turner refuses to co-operate with the Tribunal and so we don;t know his intention), but it never made it to the Fianna Fáil account. Richardson pocketed the $10,000 cash in Manchester, and bought 'corporate gifts' with it for FF fundraisers - or so he has told the Tribunal.

As noby points out, the significant fact here is that Ahern was obviously closer to Turner than he has represented. Funny, O'Connor is his friend but they didn't go to matches together, whereas he went to (at least 2) matches with Turner but he wasn't his friend.

Does anybody still believe the digout story, seriously? Apart from dyed-in-the-wool FFers, that is.

[Bald Student]

surely Ahern doesn't help out every stranger he meets with their application.The thing is, I think he probably does. He has a good few staff and volunteers in his constituency office who probably spend their whole day doing this sort of stuff.

[jebus]

The thing is, I think he probably does. He has a good few staff and volunteers in his constituency office who probably spend their whole day doing this sort of stuff.

I doubt this particular application was handled by those people htough. The main point coming from this though really isn't Bertie giving out this passport, it's that this incident has shown that Bertie was possibly/probably lying to the tribunal about his connections to Turner

[GavinZac]

I doubt this particular application was handled by those people htough. The main point coming from this though really isn't Bertie giving out this passport, it's that this incident has shown that Bertie was possibly/probably lying to the tribunal about his connections to Turner
Why? What about the "connections"? And why would he bother, considering that that particular relationship isn't the subject of the tribunal?

[jebus]

Why? What about the "connections"? And why would he bother, considering that that particular relationship isn't the subject of the tribunal?

Why in relation to the office staff? Because if I had donated 10k I would want someone other than a Young FFer pushing thorugh my passport application

Bertie has said that he isn't a friend of Turner's, but the evidence of free Old Trafford tickets, donations, and express passports might point to that being a porky.

He was asked about Turner in the Tribunal, hence if he had lied about said connection to the Tribunal he could be in a spot of bother, not to mention the damage it will further do to his former 'honest man' reputation

[GavinZac]

Why in relation to the office staff? Because if I had donated 10k I would want someone other than a Young FFer pushing thorugh my passport application

Bertie has said that he isn't a friend of Turner's, but the evidence of free Old Trafford tickets, donations, and express passports might point to that being a porky.

He was asked about Turner in the Tribunal, hence if he had lied about said connection to the Tribunal he could be in a spot of bother, not to mention the damage it will further do to his former 'honest man' reputation
My father gets a fruit basket every Christmas from Eastern Electrical. Does this mean they are good friends? No matter how you try to spin this all it does is come across as either naive or scraping the barrel, or more likely somewhere in between

[monutdfc]

Why? What about the "connections"? And why would he bother, considering that that particular relationship isn't the subject of the tribunal?
One the day of one of the supposed sterling lodgements Ahern made in AIB O'Connell Street the bank did not take in enough sterling for the supposed lodgement to have taken place. They did, however, take in other currencies (the f/x record was split between sterling and other currencies) in an amount over $45,000. The story of the supposed sterling lodgment was changed to a mix of sterling and punt to match the amount lodged, because at the exchange rate at the time it could not have been a round figure in sterling. However, using the exchange rate for amounts up to $2500 (or maybe 2500-5000, I'm not sure) (ok, the wrong rate, but there were very little fx transactions in the bank for higher amounts so the staff would have been used to using the lowest rate) the amount lodged equals $45,000 exactly.

Thus the evidence points towards Bertie having made a dollar lodgement.

What has this to do with Turner? Well Turner has already made a dollar donation to Richardson, he worked for an American consortium, thus he may be the source of this dollar lodgement.

So that's why Bertie would bother. He denied any dollar transactions whatsoever.

[superfrank]

I don't think this incident is so bad but I remember a few years ago the British Home Sec (Plunkett???, blind guy) resigned when it emerged a visa for someone he knew personally was "fast-tracked" because the person knew him. Will Bertie follow suit?

On the subject, my Australian step-father was helped by my aunt, a retired civil servant, to get a PPS number. Is this good or bad seen as she's not a politician?

[monutdfc]

I don't think this incident is so bad but I remember a few years ago the British Home Sec (Plunkett???, blind guy) resigned when it emerged a visa for someone he knew personally was "fast-tracked" because the person knew him. Will Bertie follow suit?

On the subject, my Australian step-father was helped by my aunt, a retired civil servant, to get a PPS number. Is this good or bad seen as she's not a politician?

The actual deed of getting the passport is no big deal - Turner was entitled to it, and it seemingly is not unusual for TDs to fast track passport applications.

But it is evidence of closer links between Ahern and Turner than was previously thought.

Also, it raises other questions, which are not incriminating but are nonetheless curious:
Why did Turner want an Irish passport anyway, when he already had a UK one? (At the time (1994) I'm pretty sure Irish passport holders still had to get a visa to visit the US)
Why did he apply through Ahern when he was entitled to it anyway and could simply apply through the normal channels?

[jebus]

My father gets a fruit basket every Christmas from Eastern Electrical. Does this mean they are good friends? No matter how you try to spin this all it does is come across as either naive or scraping the barrel, or more likely somewhere in between

From the guy arguing Bertie's case solely because he likes to be disagreeable? Scraping the barrell of what? Bertie's financial muddle? Because there is a whole truck load of it waiting out back for delivary

[osarusan]

My father gets a fruit basket every Christmas from Eastern Electrical. Does this mean they are good friends? No matter how you try to spin this all it does is come across as either naive or scraping the barrel, or more likely somewhere in between

Gavin, how would you class the relationship between them?

[GavinZac]

From the guy arguing Bertie's case solely because he likes to be disagreeable? Scraping the barrell of what? Bertie's financial muddle? Because there is a whole truck load of it waiting out back for delivaryYeah because if I disagree with you, Im just doing it for the sake of it right? Its not like I voted the
way I'm talking. :rolleyes:

Gavin, how would you class the relationship between them?My father and the guy who runs eastern? A good customer-supplier relationship. Bertie and this chap? I don't know, and I don't see that it matters or why anyone else's guess at what they think the relationship was. I mean, ffs, how many people can categorise the people they deal with? You're a friend one moment nd an emotionless vendor the next.

Unless it is related to Bertie Ahern compromising his position as Finance Minister I don't see how/why it matters and I can understand why the Taoiseach would be annoy at these seemingly cul-de-sac probes. And be relation I dont mean rubbish like:

One the day of one of the supposed sterling lodgements Ahern made in AIB O'Connell Street the bank did not take in enough sterling for the supposed lodgement to have taken place. They did, however, take in other currencies (the f/x record was split between sterling and other currencies) in an amount over $45,000. The story of the supposed sterling lodgment was changed to a mix of sterling and punt to match the amount lodged, because at the exchange rate at the time it could not have been a round figure in sterling. However, using the exchange rate for amounts up to $2500 (or maybe 2500-5000, I'm not sure) (ok, the wrong rate, but there were very little fx transactions in the bank for higher amounts so the staff would have been used to using the lowest rate) the amount lodged equals $45,000 exactly. Thus the evidence points towards Bertie having made a dollar lodgement.reminds me of the 9/11 conspiracy theorists and their ridiculous numerology "clues". Theres more Ifs in there than your average alien cover-up.

[John83]

reminds me of the 9/11 conspiracy theorists and their ridiculous numerology "clues". Theres more Ifs in there than your average alien cover-up.
Whatever about the dollar deposit theory, the fact is that Bertie claimed a sterling lodgement and changed his story when that was shown to be false.

And back on topic, I agree with those who say this story is nothing much. The guy got a politician to cut out some red tape. Woo. I did it a few weeks ago. Ipso facto, Seamus Brennan is corrupt! :rolleyes:

[monutdfc]

reminds me of the 9/11 conspiracy theorists and their ridiculous numerology "clues". Theres more Ifs in there than your average alien cover-up.
Ok, I'll take out the "ifs" and leave in the facts:
Fact 1: on the day Ahern claims to have lodged c.30k sterling the bank only took in about 2k sterling
Fact 2: on the same day the bank took in an amount in excess of $45k in other currencies
Fact 3: on the same day Ahern lodged a punt amount equal to c30k sterling or c$45k into his bank account. He claims this was a combination of sterling and punts converted to punts, mostly sterling.

All of the above facts can be clearly seen in the tribunal transcripts.

[jebus]

Yeah because if I disagree with you, Im just doing it for the sake of it right? Its not like I voted the
way I'm talking. :rolleyes:


You gave them your third choice, if memory serves correct, and for reasons like, well Fine Gael would do the same

[GavinZac]

You gave them your third choice, if memory serves correct, and for reasons like, well Fine Gael would do the same

I voted for the underdog Socialist party candidate Mick Barry. Because of our great voting system, my vote was transfered to Fine Fail. I ranked them higher in preference than Fine Gael because I am satisfied with FF's past performance and more importantly I believe they are better placed to steer the country for a "soft landing", and certainly more so than a changed government whose over reliance on sensationalist anecdotes over hard facts and evidence inspired no confidence. I did state that even if FG could match up performance wise to FF, I would not vote for them for your reasons - perceived corruption or disenfranchisement, because of the turbulence electing an inexperienced government would cause at a time of finely balanced danger. I did not vote for Labour (because of their alignment with the "alternative government" but had they not so aligned themselves I may well ahve ranked them ahead of both treaty parties..

[pete]

Obviously I am not familiar with the way the civil service works but when I need a passport I naively get the form off the Passport office & make an application. If I was in a hurry I would queue up at the office itself. If it was my first application I would get local Garda to sign the form required. What possible reason I require the Minister for Finance to vouch for me? :confused:

Of course if this is normal practice does it mean Bertie gets passports for people he barley knows or as already suggested he a close friend of this Turner guy who just happened to give dollar donation (surely it should be in Sterling if going to be foreign currency?) all in the same year he looking for backers of controversial casino.

How many more coincidences... :rolleyes:

[monutdfc]

This US/UK consortium looking to build a casino in Dublin calls themselves 'Sonas' - an Irish word we are all familiar with from those fun books we used to get at school. Then the promoter - presumably a UK passport holder - gets himself an Irish passport (to which he is entitled). Not unreasonably, they are giving their venture an Irish veneer, and not a crime.
This greening of the venture is facilitated by Ahern - hardly the actions of a man who is (supposedly) against the casino.

[osarusan]

This greening of the venture is facilitated by Ahern - hardly the actions of a man who is (supposedly) against the casino.

How did he "green" the venture?

[Bald Student]

Of course if this is normal practice does it mean Bertie gets passports for people he barley knowsAt I guess I would say that he regularly gets passports for people he doesn't know at all.

[monutdfc]

How did he "green" the venture?I didn't say he greened the venture, I said he facilitated the greening of the venture by facilitating Turner's passport application.

It is admittedly speculation as to why Turner wanted an Irish passport. Maybe he was travelling to the Middle East and preferred to travel there on an Irish passport rather than a UK passport (as Brian Keenan did for example)

[pete]

Slight off topic but I love Berties answer to queries about why he does not have a Tax Clearance Certificate...

From todays Irish Independent (http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/fionnan-sheahan/straight-answers-needed-to-taxing-bertie-questions-1277938.html)



"Taoiseach, just in relation to this complaint that has now gone into the Public Office Commission, can I ask you a question on your Tax Clearance Certificate issues. Have the Revenue Commissioners informed your advisers that they will have to wait for the Mahon Tribunal to report back before finalising your own situation?"

Mr Ahern looked directly at me and nodded his head twice. But he didn't say anything audible so I prompted him again, by saying, "Yes?".

In fairness, his response was pretty clear.

"Yes. That, that, that... the issue here is very, very simple. In tax law, the application certificate and the tax clearance are the same in law.

"And the position taken by the Revenue is that they can't finalise it until Mahon's work is finished. So, I mean, that's fine by me. I have no difficulty with that, I have no difficulty with the Revenue position."

Mr Ahern responded to another question on the matter and in total he used the words "finished" or "finalised" six times in relation to Mahon's impact on his dealings with the Revenue.

Even by the Taoiseach's regular standards, it was crystal clear.

Until the Mahon Tribunal had reported, the Revenue Commissioners couldn't sort out whether or not he had a tax liability.

Until his tax affairs were cleared up, the State ethics watchdog couldn't adjudicate on a complaint on the tax clearance certificate he produced in 2002.

Then yesterday the story changed -- completely.

Mr Ahern's response to Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore's quite similar question on his contacts with the Revenue Commissioners was quite astonishing.

"It is not correct, and if I said so, I was not correct -- I cannot recall if I said it, but I did not say, or if I did, I did not mean to say it -- that these issues could not be dealt with until the end of the Mahon Tribunal," the Taoiseach said.


For E350k+ a year I would expect better communication. Once the lies start it is always difficult to keep track of them.

I believe you need a Tax Clearance Cert to do business with the state but you don't need one to run the country.:rolleyes:

[noby]

That second quote you highlighted is brilliant.

[Lionel Ritchie]

"It is not correct, and if I said so, I was not correct -- I cannot recall if I said it, but I did not say, or if I did, I did not mean to say it -- that these issues could not be dealt with until the end of the Mahon Tribunal," the Taoiseach said.


That second quote you highlighted is brilliant.

Somewhat disturbing report on Morning Ireland that, in the Dail record, this statement has been tarted up and straightened out and there is no reference to the debate in which it was made.

[dahamsta]

I heard that statement with my own ears on Newstalk, in a re-enactment obviously.

[pete]

That second quote you highlighted is brilliant.

The Irish Times has a very funny article on it yesterday. I think they called it a quadruple negative :D

[Ringo]

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/enda-met-casino-syndicate-partners-1280144.html


FINE GAEL leader Enda Kenny held meetings with promoters of two major Dublin casino projects, including business partners of controversial businessman Norman Turner, the Sunday Independent has learned.
Mr Kenny also met with representatives of the Rehab-Crockford casino consortium headed by Frank Flannery, the Fine Gael director of elections at last year's general election

A spokeswoman for RTE said last night that details of Mr Turner's Irish parentage were not relayed to the station from the Government Information Service (GIS) until 9:10pm when chief news correspondent Charlie Bird was notified shortly after he had concluded his report


Interestingly, Mr Hogan did not release details of Mr Hynes informing Mr Furlong that Bertie Ahern shared his personal misgivings on the acceptability of the scale of the gambling operations envisaged by Mr Turner's consortium for the Phoenix Park.

According to the FOI records, Mr Hynes said Mr Ahern had shared his "misgivings about a casino operation in which there would be a significant gaming machines element".

The high moral ground can be a lonely place. No wonder Enda's been so quiet about over the last few days:rolleyes:

[Macy]

Yeah, it's exactly the same. A Minister for Tourism meeting a Hotel Group in an official capacity and then recommending against the casino is exactly the same as the Minister for Finance and TD for area meeting Hotel Group Chief at a football match, recieving undeclared donations, pursuing the project with the national lottery, denying even really knowing him and then processing a passport application for him :rolleyes:

The point about the passport is that Ahern has said several times he doesn't know Turner in a personal capacity, yet his passport application is processed by his office. Forget all the guff about the number of other applications, it's evidence that he did know Turner. Then tie it in with the timing of the 10k to Berties bagman that we know came from Turner, never mind the timing compared to other lodgements that Bertie can't explain in the very week of the passport application.

As for the Tax Clearance situation, Ahern is between a rock and hard place. Full disclosure to Revenue will lead to a settlement there. If he declares what's in the public domain now, and the tribunal uncovers more donations/ digouts/ payments (delete as applicable to todays version of events) that he didn't declare to the revenue then he's committed a criminal offence. Come totally clean with the revenue and he could risk putting more money out there for the tribunal to investigate. Hence we have the nonsense of the last week and his quadruple negative response in the Dáil (shamefully not in official transcripts) to try and continue the muddying of the waters as to when Revenue can make a decision. They can make a decision tomorrow if he gives full disclosure.

[pete]

No news scandals for Bertie this week or did I miss any?

If a politican leader in another country was getting so much bad press we would be laughing at the stupidity of their voters e.g. Bush in the US.

[Macy]

If a politican leader in another country was getting so much bad press we would be laughing at the stupidity of their voters e.g. Bush in the US.
Why would be expecting a good 40% of the electorate to suddenly start wanting high standards in high office. Never bothered them about Dev syphoning off funds for his own benefit; never bothered them about Haughey being corrupt; it doesn't bother them that our elected leader wouldn't get a taxi licence (or a waste licence or a C2 card or a contract with a state organisation) because of his tax situation or that he took payments from business men that at the very least he subsequently appointed to state boards.

[Bald Student]

it doesn't bother them that our elected leader wouldn't get a taxi licence Thar's probably a good thing, didn't the tribunal discover that he doesn't have a driving license.

[Macy]

So Bertie's version of full cooperation with the Tribunal is very much taken from the Haughey/ Burke/ Lawlor school. What exactly is he trying to avoid being cross examined on? He either lied to the Dail or lied to the Tribunal - no other logical reason that he'd try and avoid being questioned on it.

"Your obstruction, stinks of corruption" as pigeonhed nearly said...