Former NIB senior official disqualified by High Court hearing

A RETIRED senior manager with National Irish Bank has been disqualified by the High Court from involvement in the management of a company on grounds of unfitness, arising from the findings of the investigation into tax evasion scandal in the bank during the 1990s.

Mr Justice Roderick Murphy ruled that Frank Brennan, of Ardglas, Dundrum, Dublin, was part of the senior management within the bank responsible over the entire 10-year period of the investigation, for not just a “failure of control” but for “ignoring or facilitating tax evasion”.

The judge said he accepted Mr Brennan was “genuinely shocked” when he heard two RTÉ television exposes of bogus non-resident accounts and of fictitious accounts (“for which he bore no responsibility”, the judge added).

However, to have learnt from RTÉ of two separate schemes of tax evasion, unknown to him, was in itself, “indicative of a shortcoming in management and control,” the judge said. Mr Brennan, with others, failed “to lead decisively and to organise effectively”.

It was difficult to understand the persistence of non-compliance “unless there were a fear that the elimination of bogus non-resident accounts” the judge said, “could result in a loss of business to the branches and of profitability to the bank”.

While there was insufficient evidence to show Mr Brennan had breached his “duty” as an officer of a company under the Companies Act, the court was satisfied that, as a result of the failure to supervise and control while a director and as senior general manager of NIB, Mr Brennan’s “conduct” as an officer of the company was such as to make a disqualification order appropriate, he ruled.

The judge will hear submissions from lawyers on May 21 next before deciding the length of the disqualification period.

Mr Brennan becomes the third senior NIB official to be disqualified arising from the inspectors’ report.