Quinn grants

The Irish Times this morning:

Speaking this morning, Enterprise Ireland chief executive Frank Ryan said he met senior management and Mr Quinn on Easter Sunday in Dublin and that all key parties are “fully engaged in an effort to resolve this matter as quickly as possible”.

Mr Ryan said he could not reveal what was discussed during the meeting and that it was too early to say whether Quinn Insurance should stay with the group or be sold.

Speaking on Morning Ireland , he said the key thing for employees now was to concentrate on doing business and focus on the causes of the situation. “There’s been a lot of discussion in relation to the decision of the High Court and the administrator etc – that’s really a consequence not a cause. I can confirm the causes are being focused on now.”

Speaking on same programme, Teresa Lynch, an Quinn Group employee, said the regulator had a job to do but that workers were seeking a compromise that will save their jobs.

“As far as I’m aware, the Quinn Group is making money, as is Quinn Direct, so I don’t see where that problem is. . . . what we’re saying is let the regulator work with us, let him talk to us, allow us that opportunity,” she said.

Enterprise Ireland granted Quinn Packaging €600,000 in 2007 and Quinn Insurance €307,705.29 in 2007. It granted €391,842.01 to Quinn Insurance in 2008 and €419,766.08 to Quinn Therm in the same year, or a total of €1.719m over two years.

Wikileaks release video of attack in Baghdad

I’ve blogged about Wikileaks here before and, despite usually focusing on Irish issues, think it’s worthwhile to do so again now.
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Updated: MSNBC coverage at the bottom.

Today they released a video showing US helicopters attacking a group of people in Baghdad in 2007. Two Reuters journalists were murdered and two children seriously wounded in the attack. It appears 12 people died as a result. On the right the son of Reuters journalist, Saeed Chmagh, grieves for his father.

Since the murders Reuters have been seeking the videos under the FOI Act but have been continuously refused.

The US government has lied about the incident consistently, claiming all those killed and wounded – including the children and journalists – were “insurgents”.

The video was released at 4pm today our time after being leaked but the western media is relatively quiet on it. Al Jazeera is leading with it. MSNBC’s Dylan Rattigan Show seems to be the only US network program going to give it a push. The Guardian and BBC each have something small and the HuffPo has some useful paragraphs;

None of the members of the group were taking hostile action, contrary to the Pentagon’s initial cover story; they were milling about on a street corner. One man was evidently carrying a gun, though that was and is hardly an uncommon occurrence in Baghdad.

Reporters working for WikiLeaks determined that the driver of the van was a good Samaritan on his way to take his small children to a tutoring session. He was killed and his two children were badly injured.

…but there’s very little else from the Western media, as far as I can see. Nothing from the Irish outlets yet.

Continue reading “Wikileaks release video of attack in Baghdad”

Cabinet Agendas 1998/1999 complete

Some Bank Holiday scanning. I have uploaded all available Cabinet Agendas for 1998 and 1999. They are available at the following links:

Agendas April May 1998
Agendas June July 1998
Agendas August September October 1998
Agendas November December 1998
Agendas January February March 1999
Agendas April May June 1999
Agendas July August September 1999
Agendas October November December 1999

Kevin Cardiff appointments diary

On November 29, 2009 I sent a request to the Department of Finance seeking the diaries of all senior staff at the Department for the period May 2008 to May 2009. In early January I still had not received the requested diaries.

On January 15 I received an email from the Department stating that my request had been mislaid, and that it was in progress. I was promised that the request would be “processed quickly”.

On January 26 I still had not received the results of my request. Two full months had passed, and under the Act this what is called a deemed refusal – where a public body fails to reply to a request within 20 working days. I felt I had given the Department more than sufficient time to answer my request. I therefore sought an internal review. The Department replied with the following:

“While noting your position in relation to the lack of information within the deadline set as being deemed a refusal, you will be aware from my email of 15 January that the information was in the process of being sought and compiled. Notwithstanding your right to an internal review, I would point out that the process of an internal review is likely to take up to 3 weeks from today, as provided for in the legislation. As the information sought is almost ready to send on within the next day or 2, I’m wondering if you wish to re-consider your request.”

I felt that sufficient time had been given, and therefore sought to proceed with the internal review due to deemed refusal. There is no fee for an internal review for a deemed refusal.

Some time later, now into late February, I received a letter containing the results of my internal review. The letter incorrectly stated I had paid 75 euro for the review and simply agreed with the decision of the deciding officer (agreeing with the exemptions applied by the deciding officer). However I did not receive the requested diaries. Pretty much every week for the following four weeks, I again and again sought the diaries, and was again and again promised they would be issued. It was within my right to appeal to the Office of the Information Commissioner, but knowing that the Department was facing significant workload I chose not to take this course of action. I called the Department last week, and sought again the documents (along with two other deemed refusals for other requests, more of that anon). I was again promised the documents would be released.

Late last week I finally received a set of diaries, minus one, the diary of the Secretary General of the Department, which I had asked for. I will be following this up with the Department on Tuesday. However I have now, after four months of waiting, received the diaries of senior staff, and will begin the process of sharing these.

From looking at the diaries, the most important is the diary of Kevin Cardiff. Exemptions under Section 28 (Personal Information) Section 21 (Functions and Negotiations of a Public Body), Section 27 (Commercially Sensitive) and Section 26 (Information given in confidence) were used to redact entries in the diary. But I believe there are a significant number of dates critical to the time period between the bank guarantee on September 29, 2008 and Anglo nationalisation in January 2009.

From around October 2008, you begin to see names like Merrill Lynch appearing in diaries. On October 17, 2008 there was a meeting “re recapitalisation” after a meeting with three people from Merrill. On October 21 there were meetings with Andrew Hastings of BNP Paribas, three people from UBS, and a meeting with GE Money. On October 22 there was meeting with Patrick Neary, the then Financial Regulator, followed by a UniCredit bank reception at the Merrion. On October 24 there was a meeting with Mark Stadler of HSBC. On October 28 there was another “recap” meeting, and another meeting with “Merrills” on the 30th. On October 31 there was a meeting with David Drumm and Willie McAteer of Anglo Irish Bank, followed by John Hurley of the Central Bank. The following week there were more meetings, HSBC, AIB, Postbank, EBS and again David Drumm. On November 7, another set of meetings, Denis Casey (ILP), Brian Goggin (BOI) and Frank O’Dwyer.

It was towards late November that the meetings become more frequent:

November 11: Merrill teleconference
November 12: Tadhg Flood – Deutsche
November 13: Philip Brennan, AIB. Tony Grimes, Pat Neary, Con Horan B McDonagh. IBF annual dinner.
November 17: BNP Paribas
November 18: Fergus Murphy/Mark Moran. S&P discussion. Conor Hillery & David Marks. B McDonagh, NTMA (5th floor NTMA).
14.00 – 15.30 Updated: Meet ML at NTMA to be followed by meeting in DOF at 4pm with CBK/FR/Acox/PWC and meeting with Minister at 5pm (NTMA).
November 24: Minister & Andrea Orcel (ML)
November 25: David Drumm re results. Conference call to Clive Maxwell. (REDACTED)
November 26: TIME??? B McDonagh, J Corrigan, B Halpin, C Horan.
November 27: SG & Governor. HSBC (grand canal harbour)
November 28: Irish Nationwide. Irish Life. EBS. AIB. BOI. Anglo.
December 4: Ring (REDACTED) Pat Neary et al
December 23: Patrick Honohan. Pat Farrell re ACS proposal.
January 9: Roadmap meeting. Updated PWC/JLL Metting re their report. Updated: Meet re planning next steps – due diligence etc – makes sense to do straigh after JLL/PWC meeting – ML have Gannt chart setting out key milestones (Boardroom 5th Floor – NTMA).

It is worth reading the entire diary. I will be adding more diaries in the coming weeks. The meeting of November 28 appears to be significant since it was across a number of diaries. Another curious date is May 5. Kevin Cardiff had a meeting with Tom Parlon, Michael O’Flynn (O’Flynn Construction) and Pat Keogh CFO Cosgrave, at the boardroom on the 5th floor of the NTMA. Likely inquiring into NAMA?


Digest – April 4 2010

Yo yo yos, you knows hows this goes etc…

– HOME

P O’Neill on the RTÉ News reporting of the IMF’s reaction to the Nama announcement.

Adrian Russell has memories of a fellow sports reporter who lived an interesting life. Also, John Riordan on Roy Keane press conferencing etiquette.

Mark Tighe on the head of the ambulance service who resigned recently.

What the HSE audit in the north west is alleged to have found is that, as well as normal travel claims, McClintock used his HSE “fuel card” to claim for €10,000 worth of petrol to which he was not entitled.

The HSE have now passed on its audit of fuel costs in its north west region to gardai.

Henry McDonald of The Guardian’s Northern Ireland staff on the future of Gerry Adams’s and Peter Robinson’s leadership.

Gav on The Last Word talking political reform

Conor McCabe has an interview with Sam Nolan who led marches for taxation reform in the 70s. Interesting as we’re seemingly about to enter another period of marches and protests.

Seriously, the apparently-consensus opinion that Lenihan is The Only Hope in a Government full of gobshites must be changing now. Also, here and, with a different angle, here.

Suzy on the changes to be made to the Civil Partnership bill

Waterford councillor, Mary Roche, doesn’t understanding the Anglo situation and isn’t ashamed to say it…

Unlike 99.99% of politicians that I have heard in recent days, I will ADMIT that I don’t understand this whole Anglo Irish Bank debacle. Problem here is that, while I’m admitting it, none (I’m convinced) of the other 99.99% understand anything about it either. But that doesn’t stop them spouting off as if they had done their PhD’s on the very subject.

They are merely parroting what they have been told – each given a few standard lines to throw out when they are asked about it. These include: “it would cost more to wind it down”; and “it’s the lesser of two evils” and “it was the Lehmans collapse that caused all this not government policy”.

They are the very worst of sheep, following dutifully into the Dail chamber and supporting the Government, as the voting fodder they are while ignorantly not knowing or caring about the well that they have thrown our economy down.

– WORLD Continue reading “Digest – April 4 2010”

Quotes from Minister for Finance, Brian Lenihan

Below are a number of quotes from Minister Brian Lenihan which were reported in the media or said by him in the Dáil since the bank guarantee in September 2008.

Several of them are clearly contradicted by subsequent events*, of which some would be very recent. Others will probably be contradicted by events* to come.

Feel free to add your own in the comment box below or email them to mark[@]thestory[.]ie (remove the brackets). Please provide a link to cite your source. It’s worth keeping a log of these as events* continue. Continue reading “Quotes from Minister for Finance, Brian Lenihan”