Early in the year 1979 Stephen McGonagle the Northern Ireland Commissioner for Complaints, later to be termed Ombudsman, completed his investigation into my complaint against the shocking conduct of Down District Council. Down District Councillors Eddie McGrady, Eddie McVeigh (deceased) and James Magee went as a Council deputation to try to get Mr. McGonagle to change this Report as the Commissioner had found the Down District Council guilty of maladministration. Mr. McGonagle refused. This information was given to my wife and me in a most confidential and friendly manner by a gentleman who called at our home during the first half of 1979. He told us almost in a whisper that the Commissioner's Report was coming out in our favour. I only realised much later that his information was impeccable because he later became a leading figure in the SDLP and was also later elected chairman of Down District Council itself. He told us that Down District Council then sent a 'high-powered' legal deputation to meet Mr. McGonagle with the same intention as the Councillors. Again Mr. McGonagle refused to be moved. In the following few months there would have been a number of other attempts by the Council to have this Report CC 19/78 changed but all without success.
The friendly gentleman who had called with my wife and me earlier, called again after the Commissioner's Report CC 19/78 was published and in a most embarrassed manner apologised profusely, saying the he did not know what had happened or why the Report had been changed in favour of the Council!
The Conservative Party won the 1979 General Election and it was shortly after Mrs. Thatcher then came to power that Mr. McGonagle was forced to change the finding of Report CC 19/78 from being against Down District Council to being against me. The implications of Mr. McGonagle's original and proper finding of maladministration against Down District Council would have been horrendous for Down District Council, Down District Councillors, local Members of Parliament and for the British Parliament itself.
Firstly, a fraud of massive proportions would have been officially confirmed.
Secondly, I would have been given automatic access to redress against Down District Council in the County Court. This would most likely have been transferred to the High Court such would the amount of compensation necessary to guarantee a just settlement.
Thirdly, the door would have been opened for thousands of other householders like myself who were and are living in terralux-built houses.
The cost to the British Government would have run into many millions of pounds, probably two billions of pounds, and is the most likely information which was relayed to the new British Government under Margaret Thatcher by representatives of Down District Council and many other Councils throughout Northern Ireland.
Dr. Maurice Hayes had this to say regarding the death of Stephen McGonagle in Seanad Éireann on April 4th, 2002:
"I also express sympathy to the family of former Senator McGonagle. As a sort of shop steward for retired Ombudsmen, I had much in common with him. I followed him into two posts, first serving as Northern Ireland Ombudsman some years after he had done so and I then had the great honour of also being the Taoiseach's appointee to the Seanad some years after him. Stephen McGonagle was a man I knew for many years. He made an enormous contribution to public life in Northern Ireland in very difficult times. He helped the trade union movement with his wise leadership in that difficult period. Senator Manning noted that he had not a sectarian or bigoted bone in his body. When he became Ombudsman, he was the first non-civil servant to assume the role and he brought common sense, tact and a gift for straight talking to the job. I think he would like to be remembered as an Ombudsman. The first Danish Ombudsman described his work as: helping to emphasise the governmental services' responsibility towards justice and efficient administration, large and small. It is the task of the Ombudsman to see to the best of his ability that all who hold authority retain a sense of responsibility towards the individual citizen. That was one thing that Stephen McGonagle did. He was a model Ombudsman and a very fine human being. I am honoured to be allowed to pay tribute to him."
So, who would have been powerful enough to have made a man of such strong character change a Report which was aimed at restoring a sense of responsibility towards me as an individual citizen by those with so much authority within Down District Council? The result was that the changed Report findings allowed corrupt officers and councillors to get away with fraud on a massive scale and caused a large Catholic family to be punished for subsequent years in order to protect this fraud. Now at Christmas 2009, this punishment is still ongoing
Such is the quality of English law and English administrative justice in this north-east corner of Ireland.