FINANCIER DEREK Quinlan has said that he has paid back more than £2 billion worth of debt to the National Asset Management Agency and Irish banks since 2009.

His declaration in the High Court in London came during the hearing into allegations by property developer Paddy McKillen that he was improperly blocked from taking control of three luxury London hotels.

Mr Quinlan accepted he would have received side payments, worth up to £50 million in one, from a number of offers to buy Claridges, the Berkeley and the Connaught.

He acknowledged he had passed “confidential and private information” to potential buyers, but insisted other shareholders were “doing the same thing”.

Mr Quinlan owned a 35 per cent stake in the holding company, Coroin, which owned the Maybourne Hotel Group, now controlled by the billionaire Barclay brothers.

Mr McKillen claims he was improperly blocked from buying Mr Quinlan’s stake by the Barclays, alleging Mr Quinlan colluded to deny him his purchase rights.

Mr Quinlan said it was difficult to attract buyers for his minority stake in the company without offering to help buyers purchase the entire group.

One Indian hotel group, backed by an Indian telecoms billionaire, offered to pay him £50 million to orchestrate a purchase, though he accepted he had never told fellow shareholders.

He had been offered a £25 million fee if he managed to help the Qatari royal family to buy the hotels, with a further £5 million for his associate, Gerry Murphy. Both deals fell through.

The court heard Mr Quinlan, who has been financially supported by the Barclay brothers for 18 months, did not have authorisation from the other directors to offer the hotels for sale.

Mr Quinlan said: “In a commercial transaction like this there are very few buyers who would be interested in buying a minority shareholding.”

Defending his decision to share confidential information, he said he made it clear that he needed to sell his stake because of the financial pressures that he was facing.

Under cross-examination from Philip Marshall, QC, for Mr McKillen, Mr Quinlan told the court it was always his practice in 20 years of business “to seek a fee”.

The financier, who had € 1.7 billion worth of loans taken over by Nama after its creation, he had intended to pass on any fees for the “benefit of his creditors”.

A judgement in the case from Mr Justice David Richards is expected in June, following further evidence from Mr Quinlan’s associate, Mr Murphy, along with Mr McKillen and his associate, Liam Cunningham.

Mr Quinlan repeatedly denied that side-payments made to him would not be passed on to Nama and his other creditors: “I was trying to get the best price for my creditors,” he claimed.

He rejected Mr Marshall’s claims he had acted improperly by not telling Nama in January last year he had signed an exclusivity deal with the Barclay brothers.

“I have had a very open and honest relationship with Nama. I was one of their largest debtors. I was always completely honest with them,” he told the court.

The Indian deal had fallen away by January 2011, but the Qatari one was still in existence; though Mr Quinlan cooled on it after they tried to cut the payment for his shares by £100 million.

Questioning his support for the Barclay bid at this stage, Mr Marshall said it was clear Mr Quinlan had backed away because the £25 million success fee was no longer on the table.

Rejecting this, Mr Quinlan said the Qataris had offered £850 million for the hotels, subject to a four-week due diligence, while the Barclays had offered a higher figure, with no strings attached.

He denied that the Barclay brothers - who have already given a £1 million loan to his wife, Siobhán, to help the family “in their financial distress” - had offered him a similar side-payment.