CRH continues on its profitable way, publishing first-half pre-tax profits of €196 million this week despite difficult trading conditions.

Would that its founder directors knew what lay ahead back in the early 1970s. It might have made for less fisticuffs in the boardroom.

At least that is what it would seem it was like, based on the evidence given to the Ansbacher inspectors by the former CRH director, Mr Robert Willis.

He was in at the beginning, when the company we know today was formed by the merger of Irish Cement Ltd and Roadstone Ltd.

"The early days of Cement Roadstone were very torrid days," he told the inspectors. "There was a lot of - I am sure I am talking in confidence here - but there was an awful lot of in-fighting. Unfortunately, the two boards were just put together in mini takeovers. The stronger eliminates the weaker.

"But the two came together and there was a great amount of argument, even physical argument, and if I may say, I got to know Des Traynor very well. He was a most sensible, calm, reasoned individual."

The late Mr Traynor, who was on the board from the company's earliest days, opened an Ansbacher account for Mr Willis in the 1980s, though the latter didn't know where exactly the account was.

He banked his CRH expenses cheques by giving them to Mr Traynor. He believed he had a deposit account with Guinness & Mahon, though he later "felt everything wasn't quite kosher". Queries to Mr Traynor, however, failed to clear the matter up.

CRH, of course, has received a lot of stick because Mr Traynor effectively ran his offshore bank from his CRH chairman's office from 1987 up to his death in 1994.

Mr Willis said he wasn't aware that Mr Traynor was carrying on a banking business from the CRH chairman's office.

"It wasn't a little man behind a grille taking in money. Speaking personally, I would not have expected CRH's chairman's office to be used for this sort of business."