B/T ACCOUNT:FORMER TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern has said he had no "direct or personal knowledge of the operation of the B/T account".
The Mahon tribunal had queried the account, opened by St Luke’s trustee Tim Collins in the then Irish Permanent Building Society in Drumcondra. It was told the initials B/T stood for “building trust”; however, evidence had also been given by bank officials, who said they had heard it referred to as the “Bertie/Tim account”.
The tribunal had also focused on a £20,000 lodgement to that account.
When Mr Ahern took the stand last February, he told the tribunal that though he had nothing to do with the operation of that account, he understood the £20,000 was money withdrawn to pay for work on St Luke’s, but which was then re-lodged when the work was not done.
However, evidence provided to the tribunal by Irish Permanent in March showed that in all probability the £20,000 lodgement was sterling.
Mr Ahern said yesterday he had nothing more to add to his previous evidence and he had nothing to do with the £20,000 lodgement.
Counsel for the tribunal, Des O’Neill SC, asked him if he had not carried out an inquiry with his staff about the lodgement in advance of giving evidence to the tribunal in February.
Mr Ahern said he had only one staff, and she did not lodge the money.
“As I understand it, either Tim Collins or Joe Burke lodged it in the first place and withdrew it and re-lodged it,” he said.
“I didn’t re-lodge it and I don’t believe any of my staff re-lodged it.”
Both Mr Collins and Mr Burke denied to the tribunal that they re-lodged the money. Mr Burke said he left the sterling in an envelope in St Luke’s for Mr Collins to collect.
