Ray Burke (Irish Politician) - Corruption Allegations

Corruption Allegations

Within months of his appointment as Minister for Foreign Affairs, allegations resurfaced that Burke had received IR£80,000 from a property developer regarding the former Dublin County Council. Burke denied the allegations but resigned from the Cabinet and from the Dáil on 7 October 1997, after just four months in office. This allegation lead to the setting up of the Planning Tribunal chaired by Justice Feargus Flood. In an interim report of the subsequent Flood Tribunal, Flood judged him to be "corrupt".

After Burke's re-election in 1989, he had made it clear in interviews that he believed that the Irish national broadcaster RTÉ was biased against him and Fianna Fáil in its election coverage, and several RTÉ employees reported that while off-air at RTÉ’s election coverage, he remarked "I'm going to fucking screw RTÉ". After the election, he was appointed Minister for Justice yet retained the Communications brief, thus holding two portfolios which had never before (or since) been simultaneously held by the same Minister.

Burke was responsible for controversial legislation that severely limited RTÉ’s ability to collect advertising revenue, and established a series of local radio stations, and one independent national radio station, Century Radio. RTÉ were ordered to provide a national transmission service for Century Radio at a price that RTÉ complained was far below the economic cost of providing such a service. For example, they were required by the service level agreement to have engineers on standby covering the entire country 24 hours a day; however the final payment for the entire transmission service was roughly equal to the salary for just one engineer.

Nevertheless, Century Radio failed to gain significant audience share and closed in 1991. An interim report of the Flood Tribunal found as fact that the backers of Century Radio had paid large bribes to Burke to secure favourable ministerial decisions. One of the local stations established was 98FM and in 2006 its owner, Irish businessman Denis O'Brien won a record €750,000 damages from the Irish Daily Mirror which had claimed that O'Brien had paid a bribe of IR£30,000 to Burke to secure a licence for the station.

Protesters against the controversial Corrib gas project, in particular members of Shell to Sea, have alleged that the deal made by Burke which exempted the oil company Royal Dutch Shell from paying any royalties for the gas extracted may have been corrupt.