Moriarty tribunal The former programme manager to Mr Michael Lowry was given a copy of an early draft of the report of the group that selected the winner of the second mobile phone licence competition, the Moriarty tribunal was told yesterday.
The draft report identified Esat Digifone as the winner.
When counsel for the tribunal, Ms Jacqueline O'Brien, put it to Mr Colin McCrea that his being given the report was a breach of the sealed process, the chairman, Mr Justice Moriarty, intervened to say that that was for him to decide.
Mr McCrea said he could recall being given a copy of the report and looking at it in his office for about 10 minutes before returning it. He said he believed he could have read an executive summary in the report and examined a chart summarising the findings of the group. The draft might have been one dated October 3rd, 1995. The fact that Esat Digifone had won the competition was announced by Mr Lowry on October 25th, 1995.
Mr McCrea said he believed he was given the report by the chairman of the evaluation group, Mr Martin Brennan, and that he returned it to him. He said he realised the importance of the document and the importance of not discussing it with anyone.
Asked why he was given it, he said it was normal for him to be kept informed of major developments. He said he did not recall bringing the content of the report to the attention of Mr Lowry.
"There was no need," he said.
He did not know if the minister knew of the provisional ranking which had been arrived at but would not have been surprised if that was the case. If the information had been given to him, Mr McCrea, then it could have been given to Mr Lowry, he said.
Mr McCrea said that he was aware that Mr Lowry wanted the competition process accelerated and brought to a conclusion. He said it was probable that Mr Lowry told him this himself. He was having a lot of meetings with Mr Lowry around this time.
Mr McCrea said that the period of the competition was one of "high political tension" for Mr Lowry. There was a vote of no confidence in him in the Dáil. There was the "Horgan's Quay affair" and issues to do with an anonymous letter.
Mr McCrea said he did not know of Mr Lowry's decision to announce the competition result on October 25th, until after it had occurred. When he arrived back in the Department that day, after the announcement, he learned the decision had been announced.
He recalled being told later by the secretary, Mr John Loughrey, that Mr Lowry wanted to make a quick announcement in order to avoid the possibility of the result being leaked.
He said there were also "political reasons" for making the announcement. Mr Lowry was under "extreme political pressure at the time" and he was anxious to get out good news. "Any politician under pressure like that would want to make a favourable announcement." Mr McCrea told Mr John O'Donnell SC, for the Department, that he saw a difference between knowing a result and a sealed evaluation process.
He was not being invited to have a role in the process when he was given the draft report. "As far as I was concerned the process of evaluation remained sealed." He said that to his knowledge no one outside the evaluation team had any involvement in the evaluation process.
Mr McCrea was appointed programme manager to Mr Lowry on the recommendation of Mr Loughrey. He did not know Mr Lowry prior to his appointment in February 1995.
He said he could recall a meeting with Mr Lowry and Mr Loughrey where it was emphasised to him that the mobile phone licence competition was to be a tight process, "free from political interference".
He said he recalled a comment by Mr Lowry to the effect that if a certain consortium won the licence it would be a particular politician's "nest egg".
He said the politician named was a Fianna Fáil member of the previous government. He said the comment was made by way of "political banter" and he did not believe Mr Lowry was taking it seriously. He later learned that the consortium concerned was the Persona consortium.
He told Ms O'Brien that there was an atmosphere of very much keeping the competition process "under wraps" and not discussing it. He recalled being told by Mr Brennan that the bids would be evaluated according to certain criteria but that the relative weightings that would be given to the criteria would not be disclosed to him or the minister. He said he could recall Mr Brennan being very firm about this.
He recalled being told that one of the bidders had not performed well in the oral presentations each consortium made to the Department.
The tribunal adjourned until Tuesday.
