Irish chemical millionaire 'guilty [only] of naivety' - McKenna

Friday June 20, 2003 16:06

by anti caca pipi lala

Green Party closes ranks to protect capitalist speculator and environmental rapist

Ciaran Cuffe TD, the Green party's environmentalspokesperson, who admitted holding shares in companies linked to chemical dumping and arms was criticised by a colleague, but only for his political naivety.

Patricia McKenna MEP said the party had been seriously damaged by the revelations surrounding the Party's Environment Spokesman Ciaran Cuffe.

Mr Cuffe resigned as environment spokesman after it emerged he inherited £780,000 in shares when his mother died.

Many of them were linked to firms the party had campaigned against.

Although he did not buy the shares himself he was criticised for not acting earlier to get rid of them.

Ms McKenna said: ``Many of us were actually quite shocked when we realised that companies we had been campaigning against were companies that one of our elected TDs had shares in.

``Having said that, as everybody recognises, he didn`t go out and purposely buy them, he inherited them from his mother.``

But she added: ``There are two things he is guilty of.

``One is leaving it so long to address the question, and secondly not actually having the political cop-on to realise this time bomb he was holding considering he was environment spokesperson.``

Mr Cuffe was accused of being a ``chemical millionaire`` after a Sunday newspaper revealed he had one of the most valuable equity portfolios of any parliamentary member and that many of his shares were in ``politically incorrect`` ventures.

The newspaper article revealed that many of the companies Mr Cuffe had shares in featured in environmentalist concerns over the years.

The Dun Laoghaire politician admitted he had been naive to hold on to the portfolio.

Party leader Trevor Sargent said the incident was a lesson to everybody in the party.

He said the incident was an oversight and he was having to pay the price for it.

Mr Cuffe will continue as justice spokesman.

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Comments (3 of 3)

Source?

by off the cuffe

Fri Jun 20, 2003 17:40

not that I don't believe you, but it's always nice to know what angle the writer is coming from

inheritance

by zq zappa

Sat Jun 21, 2003 03:07

he inherited the stocks - he did not invest in those stocks purposely.

should he have divested after his grandmom or whoever died? yes.

is it a big deal? no.

will others use this for political whoopie-do? of course.

does anyone really care? no, not really.

to the writer of this post

by pc

Sun Jun 22, 2003 15:26

Green Party closes ranks to protect capitalist speculator and environmental rapist

if you wnat people to learn and agree with your articels writting it useing language likethat won't help

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Irish chemical millionaire 'guilty [only] of naivety' - McKenna

Comments (3 of 3)