Consumers face €600m bill over Quinn deal

INSURANCE consumers may have to make up a shortfall of about €600 million once the sale of Quinn Insurance to Anglo Irish Bank and US insurance firm Liberty Mutual is completed.

It is understood Anglo and Liberty are not willing to take on all of the company’s losses, so the Government will have to make up the shortfall, which could result in a levy for policyholders.

Responding to this, the Quinn family said it was a “truly appalling admission” by administrators appointed to the firm last year of the enormous damage they have caused to one of Ireland’s most successful companies in just 13 months.

“We have maintained throughout the past 13 months that the appointment of administrators to Quinn Insurance did not have a legal basis and was a major commercial mistake, considering that the company had €1.1 billion of cash and property assets valued at €400m at the time of appointment,” the family said.

“We voiced our concerns repeatedly that it would eventually have huge negative knock-on implications for jobs, competition and the state. This now unfortunately appears to be coming to pass.”

Mr Quinn’s family owes Anglo Irish bank €2.5bn, but many people in his home area remain loyal.

Protesters who occupied the Quinn Group’s Co Fermanagh headquarters yesterday said they fear for jobs in the company without Sean Quinn at the helm.

The demonstrators staged a sit-in at the building in Derrylin to highlight their support for Mr Quinn in the wake of the decision by Anglo to remove the company’s founder.

The protesters, who wished to hand in a letter raising concerns for the future of the group, reportedly only left the scene following a message from Mr Quinn asking them to do so.

A spokesperson for the Quinn Group said that the protest and illegal trespassing at the company’s head office in Derrylin was “extremely disruptive” and damaging to the business.

Anglo Irish Bank recently appointed KPMG to take control of the Quinn family shares in the business.

The bank said it was owed an enormous amount of money by the Quinns, which they were not in a position to repay, despite Mr Quinn’s claims he had a strategy to repay the money.

Employees have been told there are no plans for any job losses.