Mr Michael Bailey paid Mr George Redmond up to £20,000 over two years for advice on planning, the former assistant city and county manager told the Flood tribunal yesterday.
He said the money was for introducing Mr Bailey and Mr James Gogarty for the sale of Murphy lands, but he could not say what his meetings with Mr Bailey were for.
Mr Redmond said he would meet Mr Bailey to get money - in large denominations - in Dublin County Council's offices, in Mr Bailey's office or perhaps in a car-park at his car. He did not count it. "Nor did I count it when I got to my own residence. I just put it away safe," he said.
He said there was nothing sinister in their meetings, and they were within the law. "There was no dissection of his motives. He was a generous man, he gave it to me and I accepted it," he said.
Mr Redmond said he never asked for the money, nor did Mr Bailey relate the money to a particular service. "I never sought anything. There was no requirement or request," Mr Redmond said. Mr Bailey needed advice on planning matters.
Mr Redmond was questioned about entries in his 1988 diary referring to Mr Bailey. "I can't be specific. The only thing I can be specific about is that I did meet him on a number of occasions," he said, nor did he remember meeting Mr Bailey eight times in 1988, as the diary reflected.
He told the tribunal Mr Bailey and Mr Gogarty were pleased at the sale of the Murphy lands on Forest Road in Swords, which was signed on August 1988 and closed in February 1989.
Although he said he met Mr Bailey in 1988 "mainly in the context of the Gogarty lands", he had references in his diary to Beverly Court, a planning application Mr Bailey was making.
There was a reference to Mr Bailey in the diary on January 28th, 1988, and he was asked about this, given that a planning application had been made for Beverly Court on January 14th. Mr Redmond said he could not say if they had met about that.
Dublin County Council turned down the application on June 10th, and on June 20th An Bord Pleanala received an appeal for this application. A reference number for the Beverly Court application was in Mr Redmond's diary on June 20th.
When asked if he had met Mr Bailey about that appeal, Mr Redmond replied that this was unlikely as he would have made a more compelling case for appeal. "I'm not going to say it's pathetic but it certainly could be beefed up," he said.