The Government will not use its share in Bank of Ireland to oppose a €843,000 pay package for its boss, Richie Boucher, because to do so would be an “idle symbolic gesture” according to Finance Minister Michael Noonan.

Heavy hitting buyers from abroad are taking us on and buying heavily discounted Irish loan books. Surveyor Margaret Kelleher, a director at Lisney Cork, looks at what’s been going on in the commercial loan market