The Agricultural Credit Corporation introduced special arrangements guaranteeing the confidentiality of Mr Charles Haughey's dealings with the bank due to his high public profile, the tribunal heard yesterday. The ACC also agreed, in the light of the former Taoiseach's "good record of payment and the sensitivity of his political position", not to register a loan which may have been open to public scrutiny.
Mr John Coughlan SC, for the tribunal, said Mr Haughey had a "stocking loan" account with the bank from the mid-1970s, which was specific to farmers. An ACC inspector only once visited Mr Haughey's farm, at the time when the loan was first advanced.
Mr Haughey's debt to the bank was £90,000 by 1984. In 1985 only the interest on that, £12,554.09p, was repaid. The following year only the interest of £15,091 was paid. The loan was discharged in 1987 with the payment to ACC of £105,000 drawn from a Guinness & Mahon account controlled by the late Mr Des Traynor.
Mr Coughlan said special arrangements were put in place, at Mr Haughey's request, for his dealings with the bank. He said Mr Michael Culligan, then ACC chief executive, had told the tribunal he did not regard the request improper or unreasonable, given Mr Haughey's high profile. Special confidentiality, involving a coding system, was afforded to ACC senior management and this was extended to Mr Haughey. He appeared to be the only person outside senior management for whom this special type of confidentiality applied.
Mr Culligan had also told the tribunal that Mr Haughey, in about 1982, asked the bank not to register a "chattel mortgage" over his stock because he felt it would make his private affairs open to media comment. Mr Coughlan said Mr Culligan thought the request understandable "in view of Mr Haughey's good record of payment and the sensitivity of his political position".
He said the tribunal would be inquiring if the granting of this indulgence was in the nature of a benefit in kind to Mr Haughey in that the bank's borrowings were not secured as far as Mr Haughey was concerned and perhaps as far as the law was concerned.