I am sure his special advisor (who exceeds the 92,000 per year pay cap, but whats an extra few thousand between FFG and the tax-payer) has advised him to go at this time.
2 reasons..
1) Not a lot of time for questions.
2) Will not make tomorrows papers in any great detail, so he hopes the story will be dead by Friday, or at worst, by the weekend).

Pure cynical dirty politics at work, i am guessing….

Dirty politics at work Cal is right . But they can not sweep this one away . Why don’t we all send him an email asking him about 1) His conflict of interest re closing down public sector beds and nursing homes and his financial interests in owning private sector nursing homes.. 2) His name appearing in Stubbs Gazette , and his refusal to pay his own debts even after a high court order to do so .
His position as a TD and Minister for Health is untenable.

The only thing that should come out of Dr Jekyll’s lips is “I resign with immediate effect for being such a numpty”…!!!

Five minutes ,he must think we are the most Subservient Nation in the World . . . . . . . .Oh Wait . Come on folks how much more bullshit can we take ?

These blueshirts are just an inch below fascism, a mere inch.

He should have put out a statement about this previously. What has been done isn’t illegal, quiet messed up and confused but not criminal. If he had said that the leases were being amended and that all sides had come to an agreement on payment and terms, and that the stubbs line was because they missed the initial timeframe for payment then he would have saved himself a lot of trouble. FG love creating needless difficulties for themselves.

He really went out of his way though to crap on his own shoes here.

Totally agree. Talk about doing the one thing to make yourself look guilty and you’ve something to hide. The man is either thick, actually has something to hide, or just doesn’t give a damn what way people perceive him.

Maybe all the above.

Yea so he can’t be personally questioned!

…And he gets to make a statement – when others before him (independents) were denied the same ability, just recently!

One rule for FG and government – another for the rest of us!

He obviously think he’ doing the ‘house’ a favour and us by even speaking for the 5 minutes. There’s a word for that attitude, ‘arrogance’!

Depend on what he has to say doesn’t it. Or does it matter since you have prejudged the issue with a nasty view? So much for fairness.

Nope.Somebody with nothing to hide who wants to put the record straight, and end speculation and accusation, does not talk and run. They set out their stall and take follow up questions.

Or a hairy baby?

He looks like a bare knuckle boxer.

He’s in Cyprus and wont be back till later today, great fn excuse!!

FG already have alot of experience in tax dodging.As for Mr Reilly some dirt will be raked up about one on the Independent TDs and the limelight will be off him.Maybe Shane Ross claiming for a pack of Tayto or some other outrageous expense.

Norman, the order against FFG Reilly was made in February this year. It didnt get reported then because Denis O’Brien ensured that no mainstream media carried the story.
This has only broke now, because an independent media source published the story (not because any of the media controlled by FFG/Labour broke it).

This story will be killed off within a number of days, unless media sources like the Journal keep it alive and well, and in front of everyones faces.

The Endo will run stories against anyone who is not FF/FFG/Labour… its their way of keeping FF/FFG/Labour in their pockets :(

Cal agreed same as very little mention Mr Hogans loan from Mr Fingleton or the charge on his apartment in Portugal.Used to read the Indo but realised it has become a publicity rag for FG,RTE not much better either.

Im no FG follower but you cant possible group wallce and o’reilly in the same category. There is a huge difference between what wallace did and what o’reilly did.

Wallace knowingly made a false VAT return and stole money from the tax payer. ie people paid VAT(21% on top of their contract sale price) over to wallace for their apartments. Wallce instead pocketed this money(increased wages to himself and his son in the year in question). Dont forget that he also stole from his employees pension fund.

Whereas O’Reilly invested in a legal tax break scheme with 9 other people(a partnership) using a loan from a bank, under the contract the partnership had to buy the nursing home at the end of the tax allowance period from the bank but this has not happened, more than likely because ALL 9 cant afford to pay their bit. This a scheme that was exercised by thousands of high worth professionals over the years in Ireland. Yes the scheme was unfair because it meant high net worth people paid a low effective rate of tax but it was NOT ILLEGAL.

Stone walled, do you not see any conflict of interest for the person who is advocating closing down hundreds of public sector hospital beds, and moving those same beds to private clinics, when that same person is invested very heavily in a private clinic himself?

Really, do you not see how that would be a breach of trust etc? Or do you want to ignore that fact, and keep on attacking Wallace for something that everyone has agreed was wrong.

Stoned Cal mentioned the conflict of interest no need for me to do so.But not trying to be pedantic there is only 5 in the group one of whom supposedly a former FG councillor who had to resign from the party under a cloud.

Cal, stonewalled is perfectly correct. Reilly acted unethically but not illegally, while Wallace was acting both illegally and unethically (not to mention hypocritically given his election platform).

You just don’t want to acknowledge that because you’re a SF supported and SF are using Reilly for PR in this case.

Which is an example of the systemic problem Ireland has in government – it’s all inter-party politicing and the work doesn’t get done as a result.

Stone

this story was first published on 17 April after a hearing in Kilkenny civil court. We can only conclude that he knew in 2011 that this issue was a going to become a financial timebomb for him. Obviously I cant say that he wasnt aware that his name would be published in Stubbs but given he is a very well educated man with an extremely large property portfolio common sense should have told him that this would be the case. Handy that he was in Cyprus when the latest edition was published. Here is the link to the first Indo article.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/health-minister-named-in-nursing-home-tenancy-case-3082260.html

@ Cal.

My comment made no mention of there not being a conflict of interest. I solely replied Derek grouping wallace and O’Reilly into the same group. One of the two stole from the tax payer and also his employees, another person availed of a legal tax scheme along with another group of people, who are now not in a position to complete a financial transaction that was part to the original agreement. Two very very different issues.

Mark Dennehy has further emphasised my point

In fact id go as far as to say that aengus o snodaigh taking thousands of euros worth of ink every month / ivor calahhey claiming exps with false invoices / pierse doherty paying for helpers out of his travel expenses etc etc is worse than what o’reilly has done. Oreilly entered a bone fide commercial transaction whereas the others unethically enriched themselves/those around them at the expense of tax payers.

Stoned “enriched themselves”you do realise that you have committed liable.Aengus didn’t sell the cartrigdes and Pearce paid his helpers and wasn’t found to have committed any wrong doing.To enrich oneself they must have kept the money or Aengus must have sold the ink cartirigdes and kept the money from the sale.Of course no problem if you have proof they enriched themselves at taxpayers expense.You do don’t you?

Norman
There is no ‘supposedly’ about the background of one of the partners with James Reilly in this venture. Ann Devitt a solicitor who in her capacity as member of Dublin County Council was found by the Mahon Tribunal to have accepted an ”entirely inappropriate” payment of 20,000euro from Rayband Ltd. for her ‘assistance’ in the rezoning of lands at Lisenhall. It further transpired that she accepted second ‘inappropriate’ payment of 20,000euro for her assistance with access arrangements to the lands which she enabled through her membership of The Eastern Health Board. She ‘resigned’ from FG in the light of these findings.

Our Minister keeps good company in his legal business dealings

In the interest of accuracy I must correct my comment. Ms Devitt’s first ‘inappropriate’ payment was not in euro as I mistakenly pronounced, it was £20,000. Apologies…

They’ve used their whopping majority to guillotine a staggering amount of Bills too, stifling debate. And Labour, the so-called “conscience of the Coalition” backs them every time!

Paul rarely agree with you but time i do.I cannot stand M Martin but everytime he questions Enda,the stock answer”i’ll accept no lectures off you,when your were in government bla bla” insert example”.

I think Labour are working their way to oblivion at the next G Election.

To be fair Norman, hearing Martin lecture anyone on ethics or good governance is like listening to lectures on child protection from the papal nuncio…

Mark yes it is hard to listen to M Martin but Enda using Martins pervious experience in government to deflect any questions wore thin along time ago.Likewise i’d be very wary of G Adams but it is the same with any question he puts to Enda “bla bla northern rock balaclva” question deflected.Does a pattern emerge do you think?

Just for the record I entered a partnership last year on a tax efficient investment but there were seven hundred other partners that I have ever met. Gerry Adams could be one of them for all I know. What I did with six hundred Euro was perfectly legal and this makes me the same as Wallace ? That’s the logic of some of the boneheads on this issue.

Mark, reading back through the comments I can’t see one that says Mick Wallace did no wrong.Tax evasion is a crime. Admittedly tax avoidance as Reilly has benefited from is not legally wrong.
However that takes nothing away from the fact that he has serious questions to answer in respect to his conflict of interests.
Also it’s interesting to note that the Oireachtas investigation into Wallace’s tax affairs will not now be as thorough as previously expected according to the news.
This could get interesting….

*should read “…in his capacity as minister” apologies.

think you may be getting a little hysterical eddie. take a deep breath…

their lack of credibility just got the fiscal compact treaty passed with a very strong majority. i agree that issues like this certainly don’t help but neither do broad sweeping statements like yours.

D.A . FEAR got the Austerity treaty passed not credibility ….. BUT passed it is .

D.A

please dont keep saying that the referendum was passed with a strong majority. Only 34.7% actually bothered voting and it was passed by 20.8% of the voting population, the majority of whom did so as a result of scare mongering by Edna & Co.Ltd..

Eddie. You are not alone in your thinking there
RESIGN RESIGN RESIGN
James Reilly just go and crawl under a rock somewhere where we will never see or hear from you again.

dont you mean the great unwashed, uneducated lazy scrounging wasters on the dole that spend all their money in pub where you work Richard!

Ann please don’t feed him.

Capers don’t taste nice either…. A waste of a vegetable

Norman I usually skip his comments, but given his disgraceful comments last week about those whose money keeps him in a job, I couldnt let it go. Will try harder to ignore him/Mark H/Tony K, in the future.

If he cannot pay the debt he will be declared bankrupt so the creditor can move on his assets.In that case as a bankrupt is not entitled to sit the Dail Mr Reilly would have to vacate his seat.The other issue is he is an elected law maker who is in breach of a court order.Can’t be trying to force laws onto ordinary people whilst in breach of the law oneself.

If personally declared bankrupt he will give up his seat. However I believe the situation is not that James Reilly is short of cash but rather partners in the syndicate and that is the reason why the settlement has so far not been made. Minister Reilly as a member of the syndicate with unpaid bills therefore had his name published.

I would expect this will be cleared up in relatively brisk fashion.

You’re right DA, I expect it to be cleared up in a brisk fashion too…..
Them carpets in Dail Eireann are massive.

FG will do a whip around for Reilly just like FF did for Bertie and it will all go away and all will develop short memories …

If you didnt know already VardaCar is also a physician.

And we Do know what he has done. He has failed to pay up on a court order ie. ignored the court ruling which proves just how arrogant FG politicains are. He obviously feels that the legal orders dont apply to him.

With regards to the court ruling, the court order clearly states that one or all members of the syndicate are liabel to pay the full 1.9 million ie. if the others involved did a runner, or were declared bankrupt and unable to pay Reilly would be obliged to pay the full sum of 1.9 million and not just his share. If he cannot meet that obligation because he doesnt have the funds, then he must declare himself bankrupt and resign his seat which will force a bye election.

Hi Roy,

Keep an eye out on here as we’ll be broadcasting the live stream from the Dáil from around 9.50pm

Hugh

Also if you have UPC it will probably be available on Oireachtas TV (channel 801)

D.A. he is in breach of a court order,listed by Stubbs as a debt defaulter.Major conflict of interest in relation to nursing homes.Substantial investment in private homes whilst he is closing public beds.Any ignorance in the afore mentioned??

While there are none of us claiming to be lawyers, I think most people have a fair grasp on tax laws. I would imagine that we are all aware that what Reilly did was above board and legal. The issue is that he has a major conflict of interest and the excuse that he informed the PIC aswell as passing power of attorney over to a third party frankly does not sit well. He has acted unethically and the minute he decided to become a public representative he should have pulled out of the deal and paid all fines incurred in doing so. He has made his private nursing home bed and now he has to lay in it. A sneaky and cowardly 5 minute speech is hardly going to cut it with the public.

There is also the morality of the whole stinking mess. Just because some one can prove they were within ”legal boundaries” does not make a situation morally right. Like Ann Reddin says , none of us are claiming to be lawyers , but we do know right from wrong , and I doi not care if O ‘Reilly has twice removed himself re power of attorney( he says) ,he is STILL financially involved in a private nursing home while shutting down public beds. He has ignored a High Court order ( jail time for contempt I believe would be appropriate ) so please less of the ” serious ignorance of tax laws ” comments . We know right from wrong ! Do you ?

To be honest with you, I would just hope that he is heard. Whether he is giving 5 minutes tonight is irrelevant, He will be grilled on this for weeks until people are baying for blood. Likelihood will be a resignation.

Personally I want him to be given time, if it is decided he acted untowardly then he should go.

But this man was President of the IMO, a healthcare professional and is a qualified candidate for the job. Which is exactly what people wanted. Ministers qualified in their fields. Who nezt, Liam Twomey? Or Sherlock?

D.A. Molony,
Grilled for weeks? that would be refreshing. Won’t happen though. This Government doesn’t do accountability, transparency or indeed grilling. The leader himself can’t answer a question in the Dail, in public, or on a certain current affairs programme so why would we expect Reilly to be different.
Circle the wagons, batten down the hatches and hope it goes away it what we will get.
Reillys obvious conflict of interest in this clearly shows he is not qualified for the job despite his backround.