The Glackin Report (Final)

Those of our readers with an interest in Irish political history, or indeed old enough to remember, may recall the small controversy over Telecom Eireann and a Johnston Mooney & O’Brien site involving such people as Dermot Desmond, Michael Smurfit and JP McManus. The controversy led to the resignation of Michael Smurfit from the board of Telecom.

Indeed, so hotly contested are the contents of this report, that Dermot Desmond went all the way to the Supreme Court in a bid to prevent the contents of the report being read into the record of the Moriarty Tribunal in 2004.

Here is a handy backgrounder from Ted Harding and Kathleen Barrington from 2002:

One of the great controversies of the 1990s, it turned on the purchase by Telecom Eireann of the former Johnston Mooney & O’Brien (JMOB) bakery site in Ballsbridge, Dublin.

In April 1989 financier Dermot Desmond reached an agreement with the JMOB liquidator to buy the site for £4 million. The property was sold to a firm called Chestvale in September 1989. In January 1990 Desmond told semi-state firm Telecom Eireann that the best price he could get for the site was £9.4 million. Telecom agreed to pay this amount.

When a controversy blew up over the sale, inspector John Glackin carried out an inquiry on behalf of the Department of Industry and Commerce. Desmond denied that he had a beneficial interest in any of the companies involved in buying and selling the site.

He rejected all suggestions that he owned a company called Freezone, which was registered in the Isle of Man tax haven. It provided much of the financing for the purchase of the property and received £1.3 million in profit. Glackin’s report, hotly contested by Desmond, found that the financier was among those who made over £5 million from the sale of the Ballsbridge property.

This report has been collecting dust on various shelves for the past 16 years, and thanks to the wonders of the interwebs we are able to bring you the full report:



Covanta contract with Dublin City Council

Here is a copy of the Covanta (Dublin Waste to Energy Limited) contract with Dublin City Council (related to Poolbeg incinerator), in redacted form, released under the Environmental Information Regulations:


Davíðsdóttir on Iceland and Ireland

Sigrún Davíðsdóttir, London Correspondent with RUV, the Icelandic RTE…

For an Icelander the demise of the Irish banks has a strong resemblance to what happened in Iceland. The huge difference is that Icelanders know a lot more about banking in Iceland thanks to the fantastic report of the Althingi Investigative Commission. So far, the Irish only have sporadic insights into their banks and their relations to big investors and clients…

Read it in full.

Transparency? Democracy? Heh.

More Anglo Irish Bank subsidaries

Here are more to add to the long list (some have been mentioned before), and it is worth noting all of these companies are subject to the Ethics in Public Office Act:

Anglo Irish Bank Limited
Anglo Irish Assurance Company Limited
Anglo Irish Corporate Bank Limited
Anglo Irish International Finance
Anglo Irish Asset Management Limited
Buyway Group Limited
Pagnol Limited
Anglo Irish Nominees Limited
Anglo Irish Bank (Nominees) Limited
Geranth Limited
Pegasus Nominees Limited
Anglo Irish Bank ESOP Limited
Anglo Irish Bank Capital Partners Limited
Anglo Irish Administration Limited
Anglo Irish Financial Services Limited
CF Limited
Modify 5 Limited
Anglo Irish International Financial Services Limited
Ansbacher Bankers Limited
IBOC Limited Irish
Buyway Limited
Knightsdale Limited
Sparta Financial Services
Fitzwilliam Leasing Limited
Anglo Irish Mortgage Bank
Anglo Irish Funding 1 Limited
Anglo Irish Funding 2 Limited
Anglo Irish Funding 3 Limited
Anglo Irish Funding 4 Limited
Anglo Irish Funding 5 Limited
Anglo Irish Funding 6 Limited
Anglo Irish Capital Funding Limited Steenwal B.V.
Anglo Irish Bank Corporation (International) PLC
Anglo Irish Holdings IOM Limited
AIT (Nominees) Limited
Anglo Irish Nominees (IOM) Limited
Anglo Irish Trust (IOM) Limited
Alexan Limited
Beaugrand Sarl
Belalan Bischoffshein Freehold SPRL
Belalan Bischoffshein Leashold SPRL
Belalan Holdings SPRL
Belalan Louise Freehold SPRL
Belalan Louise Leashold SPRL
Belalan Meir Freehold SPRL
Belalan Meir Leashold SPRL
Berala Sarl
Castle Farm Campus (Telford) Limited
Chancery Place Limited Sarl
Erste DIG Vermogensverwaltungs GmbH
Fellstar Limited
Fenlay Limited
Finsbury Dials Sarl
Harpen Ostenhellweg GmbH
Heywood Park Limited
Kernesk Limited
Ladyland Limited
Moreton Limited
Newbury (GP) Limited
Petersen Limited
Portwall One Limited
QBC Czech SRO
QDH Czech SRO
Racol Sarl
Sajola Sarl
Salado Enterprises Limited
Sheps (PHFL) Limited
Starcrest Limited
Talca Enterprises Limited
Tarnold Holdings Sarl
West Port Sarl
Westow Limited
Woolgate SA
Zeus Investments 1 SPRL
Zeus Investments 2 SPRL
555 NMA Investors LLC
Alpha Ceres GP LLC
Alpha Ceres REIT, Inc.
Beta Ceres GP, Inc.
Delta Ceres (STAP), Inc.
Gamma Ceres GP, Inc.
Zeta Ceres Capital, Inc.
Zeta Ceres GP, Inc.
Zeta Ceres New York LLC
Zeta Ceres REIT, Inc.
Zeta Ceres, Inc.
Anglo Irish Boston Corporation
Anglo Irish New York Corporation
Anglo Irish Chicago Corporation
10 South State Street Holdings LLC
10 South State Street Property LLC
Mainland Investments GP Inc
Mainland Ventures Corp
Project B Investor Limited Partnership
Project B Investor II Limited Partnership
MBB Investment Partners Limited Partnership
CWB Holdings Limited Partnership
CWB Hotel Limited Partnership
CWB Retail Limited Partnership
CWB Apartments Limited Partnership
Beta Ceres Limited Partnership
Gamma Ceres Limited Partnership
Zeta Ceres Limited Partnership
SEAPORT CPA Limited Partnership
10 South State Street Property Investor, Limited Partnership
Mainland Investments 625 NMA, Limited Partnership
TA Newbury Street Fund Investor, Limited Partnership
10 South State Street Property GP, LLC
Anglo Irish Equity Limited
Anglo Irish Private Capital Limited
Anglo Irish Leasing Limited
Berfors Nominees Limited
Finance 2000 plc
Clickinput Limited
CDB (UK) Limited
Anglo Irish Property Lending Limited
Anglo Irish Property Investors Limited
Anglo Irish Finance Limited
Anglo Irish Credit plc
Anglo Irish Commercial Properties (No. 1) Limited
Anglo Irish Commercial Properties Limited
Anglo Irish Carry Partner Limited
Anglo Irish Capital GP Limited
Anglo Irish Asset Limited
Anglo Irish Asset Finance plc
Amblepath Properties Limited
Argyle Investment Finance Limited
Anglo Irish Treasury Financing Limited
Anglo Irish GP Holdings Limited
Anglo Irish Property Investors GP Limited
Sutherland Finance And Leasing
Anglo Irish Covered Bonds Limited Liability Partnership
AALP Guernsey Limited
AALP Galashiels Limited
AALP England Limited
AALP Sunbury Limited
IFT Nominees Limited
CDB Investments Limited
Industrial Funding Trust Limited
Anglo Irish German Retail Limited
Soundbow Limited Liability Partnership
Anglo Irish Covered Bonds Finance Limited
Moorevale Investments Limited
Moorevale Investments (Brigade House) Limited
Carisbrooke Anglo Ventures Limited
Carisbrooke Property Investments Limited
Carisbrooke Properties Limited
Carisbrooke Properties (Barry) Limited
Carisbrooke Central Investments Limited
Carisbrooke Properties (Basingstoke) Limited
Carisbrooke Central Limited
GPF Investments Limited
Carisbrooke Lime Street Limited
Countryroad Investments Limited
Taurus Euro Retail Holding Sarl
Taurus Euro Retail Finance Sarl
Taurus Euro Retail Investment Sarl
T-R RE-Fund 1 GmbH
Monument Securitisation (CMBS) Limited
Monument Securitisation Holdings Limited
Monument MT No. 2 Limited
Monument Securitisation (CMBS) No. 2 Limited
Monument Securitisation Holdings No. 2 Limited

Tazbell, contracts and Quinlan

Bottom of the main business page from Friday’s Irish Times…

[Tazbell Holdings/Group] has won a tender from the Department of Justice to manage “the collection of overdue court-imposed fines”.

The contract, won by Dublin-based Tazbell, involves managing the collection of unpaid court fines through “proactive contact attempts” with the debtor. This will include “traditional credit management methods”, such as letters, phone calls and e-mails.

As the article also states, Tazbell is owned by Derek Quinlan, the well-known financier who’s currently selling his property on the exclusive Shrewsbury Road. He’s one of the top ten property investors heading into Nama via one of his other companies, Avestus.

The parent company over all his enterprises is registered on the Isle of Man. In August last year Quinlan took up permanent residence in Switzerland for “tax and personal reasons“.

Quinlan is also a director in Park Rite, which runs many of the car parks around the nation’s cities (Dublin alone: Arnotts, City Quay, Tallaght Hospital, St James’s Hospital, Fleet Street in Templebar, Mount Carmel Hospital, Parnell Street and a few more). On top of that Park Rite is the parent company of Dublin Street Parking Services. DSPS is an unlimited company not required to file accounts with the CRO. However, the Dublin City Council budget for 2009 shows that DSPS was paid almost €10m that year for “clamps, removals or car relocations” by the Council. It’s a clamping company contracted by the Council.

Quinlan – via Tazbell – also now has the contract for court fine debt collection. Oh, and he collects the toll on the M4-M6 motorway too via another company (a public-private partnership construction), in case you’re passing through.

So you can either pay to park with Tazbell or get clamped. Or you park in the pay-and-display… though you should be aware that if you overstay and catch a fine it’ll be Tazbell that’ll force you to cough up. Or park in one of the smaller car parks if you can find one… and good luck doing that as you rush into Tallaght Hospital, St James’s, Mount Carmel or University College Hospital Galway.

All the while he pays tax in Switzerland, bases his parent company in the Isle of Man as the taxpayer – the same one he’s clamping, charging and chasing for fines – takes on his loans through Nama.

Larrrrrvley innit?

Digest – October 11 2010

Think this has now become a Monday evening rather than Sunday night thing.

HOME

Guardian video package on RUC torture of Northern Irish citizens

Alexia Golez reviews The Social Network

Your senators’ information displayed.

Come Here To Me! talks about Dublin early on a Sunday morning. Last time I got up early of a Sunday I walked past three different sets of people snorting coke in shop doorways. Classy.

Turbelence Ahead on middle class anarchists. Zerohedge says they’re coming.

Mark Pollack: emerging from Hell…

I woke at 4 a.m. Silence has replaced the menagerie of beeps and alarms and groans of my open-plan home for the last couple of months. I am spending my first night in the rehab ward and the initial difference from the acute ward is the sound. For the moment I am in a single room, away from the din of the 6 bed bay of before. In a matter of days, alongside my physical relocation, my mind has moved to a significantly more positive place.

I wrote the above paragraph only hours after I posted my last blog, which detailed how my fight was waning. But, after my short reprieve from infections (enough of a reprieve for me to insist I be moved from the acute ward), on day 1 in rehab I was exhausted… another infection was brewing.

Promo for The Boat Factory play set in Belfast. Via Alan’s blog.

WORLD

Roy Greenslade on the emerging opinion that the divide between journalist and advertising sales executive is – or should be – closing.

Krishna Guru-Murthy of Channel 4 defends bloggers from under-informed journalist.

Arab-American student finds FBI tracking device on his car, tells the interwebz.

The New Yorker on an emerging media mogul who has built his growing empire on being anti-media mogul.

Vidjoe: South Korea’s coffin academy…

Dying To Live from Matthew Allard on Vimeo.

OTHER

New Left Media’s Chase Whiteside lets Tea Party attendees answer questions. There are hilarious (and often offensive, unfortunately) results.

Cabinet Agendas January to July 2000

For some time now we have been seeking the Cabinet agendas for meetings from 1998, 1999 and 2000. We now have all agendas from April 1998 to July 2000. These records are available because of the 10-year rule in Section 19 of the FOI Act. This is the first time these documents have appeared in the public domain.

It should be noted that many of the industrial grants in these records have been redacted for commercial sensitivity reasons. I currently have an appeal with the information commissioner pending, arguing that since up to 12 years have passed since these meetings/grants took place, it is unlikely the records remain commercially sensitive.



Lenihan conference call post-Anglo announcement

Audio recording of the so-called ‘Chimpgate‘ conference call between Brian Lenihan and 300 investors arranged by Citibank is embedded below. The audio quality is awful, anyone who can clean it up get in touch and I’ll send you a copy. I advise use of the best headphones you can get your hands on, the sound gets really bad at points but you can make out most of it…

EDIT: First posted on Zerohedge. Downloaded and sent on to us by a friend of the blog. Seems this is the second 45 minutes of the call following problems with the first half (which supposed included the heckling)…

Zerohedge claims…

And while Ireland is still refusing to acknowledge that anything out of the ordinary happened [regards heckling], and Citi has most certainly deleted any copies of the first part of the conference call, the second part of the call was obtained by Zero Hedge. What is obvious from the call is the extreme sensitivity the operators and organizers have toward any open line, while proffering extreme apologies for the confusion that was prevalent on Part 1 of the call, which apparently lasted for 45 minutes (the entire call ended up being one hour thirty minutes, after it was supposed to be half that duration).

The Q&A starts at 9 minutes, prior to that it’s mainly John Corrigan of the NTMA and Minister Lenihan reeling off their standard lines. 45 minutes in total.

If the audio bar isn’t working try this link.

I’m no expert on this topic but perhaps others may have a interest in a listen.

Business hacks and bloggers say the first half of the call is never likely to emerge.

Now, can we as a society chill on the use of ‘-gate’? Puh-leez.