When Cowen played golf with FitzPatrick in 2008

TThe response of Taoiseach Brian Cowen to the recent disclosure that the affairs of Anglo Irish Bank were apparently not discussed during a golf outing to Druid’s Glen GC in July 2008 he had with Seán FitzPatrick, at the invitation of Cowen’s friend, Fintan Drury defies credibility and beggars belief. It is tone like the response one might anticipate from a shifty, tribal African chief with vulnerable democratic credentials and more to hide than reveal.

But Cowen’s reaction also provides an interesting insight into where his own centre of gravity is; what his default position is with respect to the entire banking debacle.

Cowen issued a statement on 10 January in which he “refutes any suggestions of impropriety” and that the outing was arranged by “a friend Fintan Drury which Mr FitzPatrick also attended”.

No one had made any suggestions of impropriety! But when precious time is spent by the Taoiseach with the Chairman of a Bank that is about the nobble the Irish nation and the invitation is extended by a friend who is a six-year veteran of the Anglo’s Risk & Compliance Committee and Chairman of that Committee for the prior four years -  until day’s prior to this golf outing – would this not be a wasted opportunity to ask some searching and penetrating questions? Who could possibly better informed about the intricacies of Anglo Irish Bank than this combination of experience, genius and insight?

Cowen’s friend, Drury, was co-opted to the board of Anglo Irish Bank on 30 May 2002 and remained on the board until 27 June 2008. He became a member of the Risk and Compliance Committee immediately and succeeded by former Anglo director Michael Jacob, who is a former President of the Royal Dublin Society, as Chairman of the Risk & Compliance Committee from 2004 until he departed from the board. This was a small committee whose membership included Lar Bradshaw who was entrusted to lead Dublin Dockland Development Authority.

The function of the Committee was to review key risks and compliance issues inherent in the Anglo business and the system of internal control necessary to manage them and present its findings to the board of Anglo Irish Bank. Did these findings, for example, include the history of FitzPatrick’s loans from Anglo and his annual year-end transactions with Irish Nationwide Building Society which came into public awareness in December of that year?

Drury, a former journalist at RTE was appointed Chairman of the State-owned television service during his tenure at Anglo, an appointment likely to have been strongly advocated by Cowen. His non-executive role at Anglo was handsomely paid. His cumulative fees his six years service amounted to €462,000. He also accumulated shares in Anglo – starting in mid 2002 with 15,000 shares and finishing with 53,796. This portfolio was worth €90,000 on 30 September 2002 and €713,335 on 20 September 2007.

Drury became a member of the board of Paddy Power Plc on 29 August 2002 and held the post of Chairman of that company from 26 May 2003 to 31 December 2008 for which he received cumulative emoluments of €818,000.  His shareholding in Paddy Power Plc increased in value from €58,420 to €448,362 when he concluded his term was Chairman.  Group revenue increased from €673.7 million in 2002 to €2,751 million in 2008.

Cowen’s statement also refers to a phone call he received from FitzPatrick on St Patrick’s Day about issues connected to the shares of Anglo Irish Bank when he was Minister for Finance. Cowen says that he informed the then Governor of the Central Bank, John Hurley, ‘that a situation was developing in regard to the contracts for difference issue in Anglo Irish Bank – the exact scale and detail of the difficulty was not apparently known as that point.’ A meeting between FitzPatrick and the Central Bank Governor and Financial Regulator (Patrick Neary) took place on 21 March 2008.

It is also noteworthy that Drury Communications have been retained by the current regime to promote the Anglo Irish Bank annual report in the post nationalisation phase. Fintan Drury founded this company in 1988 and retired from the business in 1999 when he sold his controlling interest in the company. One of the directors of Drury Communications, until September 2009, was 72-year old David M Kennedy, former boss of Aer Lingus and, incidentally, father of Patrick Kennedy the chief executive of Paddy Power Plc.