Business at Ireland’s most celebrated eatery— Dublin’s Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud — is on the up and up with its eponymous co-owner yesterday confirming it has just enjoyed its best ever year since it opened 35 years ago.

Rare praise from one of AIB’s board most trenchant critics came late into what was one of the oddest shareholders’ meetings ever held in Ireland.

Ireland’s most celebrated restaurant had its busiest year in 2014 since opening 34 years ago leading to a profit jump of €88,000.

Pre-tax profits at the hotel group that co-owns the luxury five-star Merrion Hotel, in Dublin, increased 9% last year to £2.19m (€3m).

Glen Dimplex’s Lochlann Quinn loves wine so much, he bought a vineyard. Roz Crowley talks to Quinn and his winemaker, Stephen Carrier about the Bordeaux, Chateau de Fieuzal    

Dublin City Council challenged one of the State’s watchdogs in court but the only real outcome is that the taxpayer foots both bills, writes Investigative Correspondent Conor Ryan.

The chief executive of ESB Pat O’Doherty saw his total pay packet rise by more than €6,000 as his taxable benefits increased from €9,000 to €15,000 bringing his total package to €358,950.

The group of unions at ESB has threatened legal action if the company’s annual accounts do not refer to its pension scheme as defined benefit and as a “balance of costs” scheme.

One of the best known five-star hotels in the country, the Merrion Hotel in Dublin, last year increased pre-tax profits by 7% to €1.6m.

The hotel group that co-owns the luxury 5-star Merrion hotel in Dublin last year increased its pre-tax profits more than threefold to £2.4m (€2.923m).

ST PATRICK’S DAY is upon us, so it is good to remind ourselves of the Irish wine connections.

The State spent over €103m renting property from Nama-hit developers, beef barons, business tycoons, banks and even religious organisations last year.

For his last 11 months as chief executive of the ESB, Padraig McManus received over €650,000, despite giving up over €140,000 in salary entitlements.

Louis le Brocquy, who died yesterday aged 95, was so venerated a figure in the Irish arts world that it is often forgotten how controversial a figure he had sometimes been.

THE only bit of hot air you’ll find in Patrick Guilbaud’s kitchen comes from the extractor fans.

THE five-star hotel the President of the United States Barack Obama checked into but never stayed at, returned to pre-tax profit last year, new figures show.

THE chief executive of the ESB saw his pay fall almost 30% to €528,886 last year but the chairman’s salary increased.

THE country’s highest paid semi-state worker is to retire.

THE ESB indicated it may cut household charges next year as the company officially opened a state- of-the-art generating plant capable of supplying 450,000 homes.

DEVELOPER Bernard McNamara will provide a sworn statement of his assets and liabilities to investors pursuing him for €62.5 million but it is “impossible” for him to outline the current value of his assets, the Commercial Court heard yesterday.

THE ESB is planning to invest up to €2 billion building up a strong presence in the British electricity market over the next decade, according to chief executive Padraig McManus.

ONE of the country’s plushest hotels, the five star Merrion in Dublin remained in the red last year although losses eased.

HOW very welcome yesterday’s announcement by the ESB that it will create nearly 4,000 jobs over the next five years. This is indeed the stuff of economic recovery.

AS THE Dáil was winding up before going on holidays on Thursday, ESB chairman Lochlann Quinn refused to speculate about forthcoming price increases.

The ESB has this evening announced that it is to embark on an unprecedented capital investment programme of €22bn.

LOCHLANN Quinn has been appointed chairman of the ESB.

Minister for Energy Eamon Ryan has today announced that the Government has approved the appointment of Lochlann Quinn as the new chairman of ESB.

GLEN Dimplex, the electrical goods company owned by Martin Naughton, has acquired a British firm Applied Energy Products.

EIRCOM became the last man standing in the race to buy Meteor yesterday after smaller rival Smart Telecom said it was no longer interested in the country's third mobile operator.

David Clerkin

GLEN DIMPLEX deputy chairman Lochlann Quinn has offloaded his stake in the electrical appliance giant for an estimated €200 million.

PRESSURE is mounting on the three top figures in AIB to appear before a Dáil committee investigating the financial scandals that have gripped the country’s biggest bank.

THE €150 million loss recorded by AIB on the sale of British asset management arm Govett was defended by chairman Dermot Gleeson at the bank's annual general meeting yesterday.

ONE of the country’s top barristers Dermot Gleeson takes over as chairman of AIB this month.

AIB has announced that Dermot Gleeson will succeed Lochlann Quinn as Chairman of the Board of AIB with effect on October 14 2003, the date of the next scheduled board meeting.

GLEN DIMPLEX has acquired for an undisclosed amount a Norwegian heating business which has a turnover of €50 million.

THE Governor of Ireland’s Central Bank is paid at least 57% more than his US counterpart, Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan.

AIB promised to meet all its pension obligations to staff despite the existence of a huge deficit of over 700m in its pension funds.

AIB BANK is expected to go on a share buy-back spree when it gets more that €900 million in cash following the approval of the sale of troubled subsidiary Allfirst to M&T Bank by the US Federal Reserve.

THE thought of the taxman arriving at the door, armed with full details of bogus non-resident accounts, is enough to give sleepless nights to the estimated 60,000 account holders.

Ireland’s AIB banking group returned a 5% profits increase in the six months to June, their interim results showed today.

The Allied Irish Banks' shareholder Niall Murphy was thrown out of today's AGM after he confronted management about the £486m (€762.4m) fraud at its US subsidiary.

Two foreign exchange traders from American giant Citibank were suspended today in the wake of the report into the €486m loss suffered by Allied Irish Bank's US subsidiary.