Phoenix Energy Holdings

Dec 22, 2022

Six months after saying it was “pausing” an honorary degree for a man involved in a Stormont scandal, Queen’s University Belfast (QUB) has said that it still plans to honour him. In June, the university did not go ahead with the award to former Phoenix Natural Gas chief executive Peter Dixon after this newspaper asked questions about what it was doing. Twelve years ago, Mr Dixon had a key role in the NI Water scandal, prompting the only demotion of a permanent secretary in the history of the Northern Ireland Civil Service. He was one of three members of an ‘independent review team’ set up by Paul Priestly, then the permanent secretary of the Department for Regional Development (now the Department for Infrastructure) to examine alleged irregularities in NI Water contracts. Unlike the other team members, Mr Dixon did the work for free, and it was alleged that he was friends with the chief executive of NI Water, Laurence MacKenzie — a potential conflict of interest because of the breakdown in relations between Mr MacKenzie and many of his board. Some of that board was sacked on foot of the inquiry, but subsequent evidence saw Stormont’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) ask serious questions about how it had operated. When those issues were raised by three MLAs — Patsy McGlone, John Dallat and Dawn Purvis — at a PAC hearing, Mr Dixon wrote to the committee: “I deeply resent the disgraceful line of questioning by John Dallat, Patsy McGlone and Dawn Purvis, who sought to insinuate that there was an improper relationship between Laurence MacKenzie and me.” Daily Headlines & Evening Telegraph Newsletter Receive today's headlines directly to your inbox every morning and evening, with our free daily newsletter. Enter email address Queen's University Stormont privilege meant that Mr Dixon was unable to sue them. It later transpired that Mr Priestly had drafted the letter for Mr Dixon to send. The committee described Mr Priestly’s actions as “utterly disgraceful”. Mr Dixon’s then chairman at Phoenix, Sir Gerry Loughran, apologised to the committee, saying that “the PAC members were pursuing perfectly legitimate questions… This was a proper line of questioning by the committee.” When asked in June why it was recognising Mr Dixon, QUB said it was for his services to business but that, “due to personal circumstances”, it had “been agreed that the awarding of an honorary degree will be paused”. QUB gave the Belfast Telegraph an off-the-record reason for the delay, which it asked us not to publish. However, Mr Dixon’s name was not included in the winter honorary graduates announced last week, even though the reason given in June implied his award would go ahead at this point. When asked by this newspaper if Mr Dixon had already been awarded an honorary degree, the university said that has not happened. When asked if the honorary degree had been cancelled, it said that it remained “paused” and Mr Dixon agreed to the delay. Most Read