Fine Gael has refused to reveal if any TDs or senators would benefit from its proposal to compensate private shareholders who lost out when they purchased Eircom shares.
The party plans to offer tax write-offs to hundreds of thousands of Eircom shareholders. However, yesterday a spokeswoman said it would not say if any of the 72 members of the parliamentary party would stand to gain.
According to the proposal, taxpayers would recoup 20 per cent of their Eircom losses by offsetting them against their annual tax bill, at a maximum cost of €90million.
"Up to 500,000 people would benefit from this proposal. In that context, questions regarding the parliamentary party on this issue are not relevant," she said.
Last week the party's deputy leader, Mr Jim Mitchell, said he had bought £10,000 worth of Telecom stock, while another Fine Gael source said party leader Mr Michael Noonan had bought £1,000, Subsequently Fine Gael said Mr Noonan had actually bought £10,000 worth of shares.
A spokeswoman for Eircom said yesterday the shares register was no longer available since it was no longer a public document. "When the company was a public limited company there was a shareholder register and people were allowed access but that is not the case anymore."
Over 480,000 private investors bought Telecom Éireann shares at €3.90 each and 420,000 of them still held the stock when the Eircell division was sold to the UK-based telecommunications giant Vodafone.
Most of these still held the stock when the Sir Anthony O'Reilly-controlled Valentia bought out the company in August 2001. Under stock exchange rules, they were forced to give up their shares.
Last week Mr Noonan said he hoped the proposal would "right the wrong" perpetrated on small Eircom shareholders so they would not be discouraged from buying into Irish flotations again.
"I don't think a single shareholder who got burned in Eircom will buy a share in a State company again unless something is done so, as a matter of national policy as well as compensation, I think it's very important to restore confidence."