Liquidator appointed to English language school firm
The Dublin-based college offered English language and business courses to mainly non-EU students.
Yesterday, Mr Justice Paul Gilligan appointed insolvency practitioner Declan de Lacy of PKF O’Connor Leddy & Holmes as provisional liquidator of The Carlyle Institute Ltd, which ceased operations earlier this month.
The judge made the appointment, on an ex parte basis after being told many of the colleges former students have concerns about the conduct of the company.
Ching-Hsiu Huang, of Killiney, Co Dublin, petitioned the court for Mr De Lacy’s appointment. She is one of 200 students who paid fees to the college. In an affidavit, she said she is owed €1,500 in respect of fees paid to the company. Her application was supported by other students of the college, who are owed €237,000, and the Irish Council of International Students. The students had enrolled and paid for courses that either did not start or had not been completed at the time of the closure.
Yesterday, her lawyers said they wanted Mr de Lacy appointed in order to secure the company’s assets and to fully investigate its affairs.
In a sworn statement, David Moore of ICOS said that, in the circumstances, it was impossible for ICOS to have confidence in the potential outcome of any ballot of creditors in respect of who is selected as liquidator taken at the creditors meeting today. Student creditors of the company had signed what they believed were refund applications but were in fact proxy forms which could be used by the directors when it came to the creditors ballot for who is elected as the company liquidator.
The matter will come back before the court later this month.
DISCOVER MORE CONTENT LIKE THIS
