Dunlop 'asked to copy file on Ray Burke'

The lobbyist and former Government press secretary, Mr Frank Dunlop, has claimed that he was asked in 1982 by the then Minister for Justice, Mr Seán Doherty, to give a Cabinet colleague, Mr Ray Burke, a copy of a Department of Justice file into allegations of planning corruption against Mr Burke.

In his political memoirs, Yes Taoiseach, to be published today, Mr Dunlop writes that he was asked to photocopy the file, which contained details of a Garda investigation in the 1970s into allegations of malpractice against Mr Burke.

Mr Dunlop says that Mr Doherty asked him to place the copy of the file in an envelope and give it to Mr Burke.

He told The Irish Times last night that the incident occurred while he was Government press secretary early in the administration of Mr Charles Haughey in 1982. He said that his office was opposite the cabinet room and that one morning Mr Doherty and Mr Burke dropped in.

Mr Dunlop writes in his memoirs: "It was not unusual for ministers to pop in for a chat, so I thought little of their visit until Doherty handed me a large government-issue envelope that obviously contained a file. He asked me to copy the contents personally and, having done so, to place the copy in another envelope and give it to Ray Burke.

"The instructions were specific: nobody else was to make the copy and I was not to show it to anybody. Furthermore, I was not to read the material I was copying."

"Naturally, after they entered the Cabinet meeting, the first thing I did was to start reading. It was a Department of Justice file containing a copy of the early seventies Garda investigation into allegations of malpractice by Ray Burke when he was a member of Dublin County Council."

Mr Dunlop says in his book that Mr Burke had boasted that he had been interviewed by the Fraud Squad on some 20 occasions.

He says that he returned the original file to Mr Doherty and gave the copy to Mr Burke and that the matter was never mentioned again.

"It was the only occasion on which I was ever asked to perform such a task. At the time I was quite concerned about it but subsequently decided that it was something best forgotten", Mr Dunlop states.

Neither Mr Doherty nor Mr Burke could be contacted for comment last night.

In his memoirs, Mr Dunlop also claims that in 1994 he was asked by people close to Mr Bertie Ahern to lobby for Mr Ahern when he was seeking the Fianna Fáil leadership.

However, Mr Dunlop says that when he approached Mr Brian Cowen, who at that stage had sat in cabinet with Mr Ahern for a number of years, the current Minister for Foreign Affairs was non committal and said "Frank, I don't know this man".

Mr Dunlop said last night that he saw his book as a "re-balancing" of the conventional political wisdom that had grown up in recent years by repetition that the former Taoiseach, Mr Jack Lynch, was a saint and that his successor, Mr Haughey, was "the Darth Vader of Irish politics".

He said that he had worked closely with both men and that he found the true situation to be more complex.

"Haughey was no saint. He had lots of faults, but that did not mean that he did not have good points."

Mr Dunlop said that the foundation of the Progressive Democrats in reality dated back to the election of Mr Haughey as leader of Fianna Fáil in 1979.

Mr Dunlop describes himself as "prematurely retired".

His lobbying and public relations business fell apart in mid-2000 when he alleged at the Flood tribunal that he had been involved in passing on money to councillors in return for planning favours.