Mr Ray Burke said yesterday it totally defied logic to suggest that JMSE would be trying to give him money to procure assistance in gaining planning permission when it would have benefited only the buyer of its lands.
Mr Burke said from what he understood, in July 1989, within weeks of the contribution being made, JMSE agreed to sell the land to Mr Michael Bailey at a fixed price.
"It would have been of no benefit to them to give me anything other than a political contribution because surely it would be foolish for JMSE to give me money to benefit the buyer of the land when there was no benefit in it for JMSE. That would be illogical," Mr Burke said.
Mr Frank Callanan SC, for Mr Gogarty, asked him about the meeting in his house in June 1989 when he allegedly received £30,000 from Mr James Gogarty of JMSE.
Mr Callanan asked him about an allegation that Mr Michael Bailey had told Mr Joseph Murphy jnr that money had been given to Mr Burke in exchange for planning permission. If Mr Bailey had said that to Mr Murphy, would it be correct. Mr Burke said it would be totally incorrect.
Mr Callanan said if Mr Bailey did say that, it squared with Mr Gogarty's evidence when he said that Mr Bailey repeatedly represented to him and to JMSE that he was able to have lands rezoned by means of Mr Burke procuring a majority vote on the county council.
Mr Burke replied: "That would be totally incorrect because I wouldn't be in a position - it would be wrong and it would be wrong in fact and it would be wrong in that I wouldn't be in a position. "I was not a member of the county council from 1987 and would not have been in a position to procure any sort of majority for anything. Fianna Fail, even if I had control of them which I hadn't, as can be seen by the evidence before the tribunal in relation to my objections to what was being done in rezoning, but Fianna Fail would not have had a majority and I don't think anybody would suggest that I would have had influence over Fine Gael or Labour or any other group in Dublin County Council."
Mr Callanan said financial contributions of any kind were regarded as confidential so why did Mr Bailey not withdraw. "On the contrary, there was nothing sinister about the donation being given to me in the course of a general election and it would have been most unusual for anybody to withdraw. Mr Bailey brought Mr Gogarty into my home. We had a chat, Mr Gogarty gave me the donation, we talked about political life and as he went he wished me well," Mr Burke said.
He denied it was a joint enterprise between JMSE and the Baileys. Mr Bailey had brought a representative of a major engineering company situated on the edge of his constituency to him in the middle of a general election to make a political contribution. There was nothing sinister or improper in that. The chairman asked if it was his evidence that when he opened the envelope and found £30,000, it came as no surprise.
Mr Burke said that the size of the contribution was a surprise but it was not a surprise that he got the contribution from JMSE because that was how it had been introduced to him by Mr Bailey. The chairman said: "In that light, if everything you say is correct, did it ever occur to you to write a note of thanks in the unique situation of considerably more coming to you than you had anticipated?"
Mr Burke replied: "I didn't chairman, because as I've said to you last week in giving evidence I never in my life wrote thank-you notes in relation to political contributions I received. And equally, neither did Mr Gogarty or anybody from JMSE ever come back to me and ask for any favours in relation to the contribution either."