A mother of 10 told a Belfast jury yesterday that her three eldest daughters were lying when they claimed they had been sexually abused as children by their father.
The woman suggested the girls, now in their 30s, were doing this because they did not like the fact that their father had married a Catholic after the couple's divorce.
The 53 year old man, who cannot be named to protect the identity of the alleged victims, is on trial at Belfast Crown Court on 18 charges of rape, indecent assault and gross indecency, allegedly committed against the girls between 1972 and 1981 when they were aged six to 14.
Their mother denied that any of the girls had come to her and complained about sexual abuse by their father.
Asked what she thought about the allegations made by her daughters, the witness said: "Not much. They are not true. I don't tell lies, it is them that are lying, not me".
The woman said she would have interfered if she had thought anything was happening, but she did not believe there was any truth in it.
The woman told the jury that she was not on good terms with her former husband.
"I did not want to be in the witness box giving evidence, but I am telling what I know," she added.
Earlier, the defendant had denied there was any truth in the allegations made by his daughters, and said they had concocted the stories because they resented his second marriage and had hoped he would get back together with their mother.
He told the jury a number of the incidents described by the girls could not have occurred because the three girls slept in a room by themselves while he and his wife were in another bedroom.
He also denied he had assaulted one of the girls during an overnight trip he had made to Scotland as a lorry driver, and said his wife would not have allowed him to take any of the children with him on such a trip.
The trial continues.