Celia is selling €600k aunts’ townhouse that brought Bertie down
Ex-girlfriend to make a tidy sum on home at centre of Bertie probe
IF ONLY the walls of this house could talk. Perhaps then some of the mystery surrounding former taoiseach and presidential hopeful Bertie Ahern’s complex financial affairs might be finally solved.
The home at North Circular Road, Dublin has quietly gone on the market, over two decades after Mr Ahern’s former partner, Celia Larkin, bought it with a controversial interest-free ‘humanitarian’ loan.
Indeed, so controversial was the very existence of the loan that it featured in the Mahon Tribunal. Although that investigation – which ran from 1997-2012 – was set up to investigate the planning history and ownership of 726 acres of land in north Dublin, it also probed allegations of payments to politicians and officials associated with decisions to rezone the land.
Allegations that Mr Ahern was paid money by developer Owen O’Callaghan led to the tribunal investigating his finances. When it concluded, it found that corruption had affected ‘every level of Irish political life’ and Mr Ahern was found to have failed to ‘truthfully’ explain sources of IR£215,000 in bank accounts linked to him.
It stopped short of describing him as corrupt because it could not link any payments to favours rendered by him. Mr Ahern disputed Mahon’s findings.
The tribunal heard that on March 30, 1993, IR£30,000 was withdrawn from the ‘Building Trust account’ (B/T) to fund a bank draft payable to solicitor, Patrick O’Sullivan, ‘in relation to the purchase of a house in Dublin occupied by elderly relatives of Ms Celia Larkin’.
The loan was – based on information the tribunal heard was given to the late Mr O’Sullivan by Mr Ahern – described as a ‘staff loan to family of employee’. At the time the loan was made, Ms Larkin was working for the Department of Finance and was a constituency worker in St Luke’s, Drumcondra.
She told the tribunal she bought the house, which three relatives, including two of her aunts, were renting as their family home, to give them ‘security of tenure’.
Ms Larkin said she believed the loan ‘had been made available to her by the trustees of St Luke’s’ from the B/T account’. She believed this existed to provide funds for the renovation of St Luke’s, and that the loan was made available ‘at no cost to the account’.
She also said it was her understanding that the loan would have to be paid back ‘on the death of the last of the three tenants in the property, or when called upon by the trustees to repay the loan, or in the event of the house being sold or there being a “change of status” in relation to the house’.
The tribunal said: ‘It appeared that no contemporaneous documentation or record, formal or otherwise, was generated relating to the advance of IR£30,000.
‘No legal steps appeared to have been taken to protect the interests of the donor of the funds, an omission which the tribunal found to be remarkable, particularly in circumstances where, having regard to the evidence of Mr Ahern and others, the provision of the loan to Ms Larkin was inconsistent with the stated nature and purpose of the account.’
The loan, which Mr Ahern said he didn’t know about until after Ms Larkin had decided to accept it, accounted for about 75% of the purchase price.
The tribunal noted: ‘The loan
‘Loan accounted for 75% of purchase price’
remained outstanding until its repayment on February 4, 2008, approximately three months after the… discovery of its existence.
‘Inclusive of interest, Ms Larkin repaid €45,510 to the treasurer of the Dublin Central constituency...’
The house has been put on the market for €595,500, which could mean a more than ten-fold profit for Ms Larkin on her investment.
The 1,496sq.ft listed property has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, two reception rooms, a 75ft back garden and off-street parking.
The MoS was unable to contact Ms Larkin for comment.
‘Could mean a more than ten-fold profit’