SINN FÉIN HAS defended its handling of an internal investigation into a complaint made against TD Brian Stanley, after details of the draft report from the inquiry emerged.
Earlier this month, Stanley, a TD for Laois-Offaly and the chair of the Public Accounts Committee, announced he was resigning from the party with immediate effect due to what he called a “seriously flawed” internal procedure.
A complaint was made against Stanley during the summer that initiated the party’s inquiry. A counter-allegation was subsequently made.
A preliminary report was given to both sides involved in the matter and they were given seven days to respond.
However, on foot of Stanley’s resignation on 12 October, the internal process was suspended and the issue was then passed on to Gardaí.
Stanley has questioned the party’s inquiry process, claiming it “lacked objectivity” and was “seriously flawed”. He has also accused members of Sinn Féin of orchestrating a “character assassination” against him.
RTÉ, The Irish Independent and the Irish Times have published details of the preliminary report, which sets out the original claim and the counterclaim.
According to the reports, it is not disputed that Stanley and the woman stayed overnight in a hotel room in Dublin in October last year. Nothing criminal is alleged to have happened in the hotel room.
The woman subsequently sought €60,000 from Stanley, which was communicated via text message. According to the reports, she later told the internal inquiry this was a mistake and the request was not pursued.
The Sinn Féin report found Stanley’s conduct had breached the party’s charter of ethics.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Saturday with Colm Ó Mongáin, Sinn Féin TD Rose Conway-Walsh said the party does not have questions to ask of itself in relation to the matter.
She said the detail reported from the draft report was her understanding of the matter “in terms of it being disputed events”.
“When we received the complaint from the party, obviously it went under a process, an investigation, and then there was a counterclaim, and then when Brian chose to leave, to opt out of that process, it was referred to the Gardaí,” she said.
“I’m satisfied that the party followed the procedures once we received the complaint, and how that was dealt with. The process was overseen by a barrister, and that’s all I can say at this point.
“That’s my main concern, that the party handled this in a way that it should have, and that any information that’s available to the party is obviously available to the Gardaí as well as they continue their investigation of it.”
Conway-Walsh denied that the initial complaint against Stanley was withheld for ten months.
“An indication of the complaint was received the end of July. The complaint was received properly in the beginning of August, and then the process was entered into immediately.
“So really I can’t respond to that at all. There’s no evidence whatsoever of that.
“When a complaint is received by any party, it could be any party, then it needs to be acted on, and the process needs to be fair and it needs to be transparent, and that’s what’s happened to this case.”
She added that the complaint was not referred to the gardaí sooner because “it wasn’t immediately evident that there could be a criminal case involved”.
Brian Stanley has been contacted for comment.
