Building societies back capital move

MEMBERS of the Irish Nationwide and EBS building societies have voted in favour of resolutions which will enable the Government to invest fresh capital into both companies.

It was also confirmed, yesterday, that preliminary discussions regarding a merging of the two companies have taken place but are in the “very early stages” and won’t commence in any serious sense until early next month.

At EBS’s special members’ meeting, in Dublin’s Burlington Hotel, the company’s chief executive Fergus Murphy and chairman Phillip Williamson told members – 80% of whom are in favour of the company remaining mutualised – that the likelihood would be that the company would be fully nationalised if yesterday’s resolutions weren’t passed.