The Bank of Ireland CEO Richie Boucher has been in the news a lot recently. Back in the mid 2000s he was bessie mates with Sean Dunne and was one of the main lenders to the Baron of Ballsbridge for what have now turned out to be disastrous projects. These days, Richie is the highest paid CEO at a bank in which the State has shares – we own 15% of the ordinary shares of Bank of Ireland and in addition own €1.5bn of preference shares; in 2012 Richie was paid a salary of €690,000 plus pension contributions of €186,000 plus perks of €34,000; Richie handed back €67,000 of his salary as a waiver. The chairman of Bank of Ireland or “Governor” is Archie Kane, formerly of British bank HBOS which was recently slammed by a recent report by the British parliament and Archie was paid €209,000 for six months in the role as chairman and picked up €31,000 extra in “consultancy fees” and €22,000 in perks. Bank of Ireland made a comprehensive loss of €1.5bn in 2012.
Minister Noonan has been intensively challenged by the Opposition over bankers’ pay, he responded by commissioning a report last June which allowed him deflect questions for nearly nine months. When the Mercer report was finally published in March 2013, Minister Noonan said he was looking for 6-10% savings in remuneration costs at the banks in which the State has an interest.
On 24th April, 2013 Bank of Ireland is holding its annual general meeting or “Annual Court” and Minister Noonan has been harried by the Opposition, notably by Deputy Shane Ross but also by others, to confirm whether he will vote in support of the existing remuneration for top management.
This morning we finally got an answer.
In response to a written question from Labour’s Kevin Humphreys at the Oireachtas finance committee, Minister Noonan has this morning confirmed that he will abstain from using his 15% stake in Bank of Ireland to vote in favour or against the remuneration of Bank of Ireland’s board. Union members who have had, and possibly still have, the threat of 7% pay cuts hanging over their heads may be scratching those same heads at the Minister’s treatment of Bank of Ireland remuneration.
NAMA Wine Lake 
Should it be “Bank of Ireland’s response” (apostrophe “s” for possessive) in Minister Noonan’s letter? And who was a school teacher?
If a Third World minister has made a statement like this about an overpaid CEO in a loss making state owned bank, one would assume that money was changing hands; the fact that in Ireland’s case money is not changing hands just makes this Ministerial apathy all the more depressing.
Maybe we should get Reggie Middleton to turn up at the AGM?
Noonan says he does not wish to “endorse the Directors’ Renumeration”.
It’s insightful to see that the default position is a simple rubber-stamp endorsement.
BoI are lucky to have such toe-the-line shareholders who always vote the right way at company meetings.
Who are these shareholders anyway? I mean, come on. The share price is measured in pennies, down from what, €24. Do the shareholders/pensions funds just not care?
OMF,
Wilbur Ross does not think so… bought at 10 cent… closing today around 16.7 cent. That’s 67% up… not bad at all…………when you can get it of course. Wilbur has publicly stated that he intends to triple his investment in BoI. Obviously he sees 30 cent a share on the horizon.
Why don’t you buy some, if Wilbur is right, you could nearly double your money!!
Noonan not voting is the same as tacitly agreeing.
Any vote to agree would be political suicide – as opposition deputies could start to bring up Boucher’s guilty history with the bank before it imploded.
He could only vote to disagree – and any sounding by the banks beforehand, to indicate such, would precipitate Boucher’s resignation before any vote.
So by not casting a vote he is actually voting in favour.
But political optics allow him to claim a neutral stance.
An Irish solution.
@WGU
“Noonan not voting is the same as tacitly agreeing”
Very much so. You may leave out the tacitly.
But Noonan did have alternative. Ensure that any remuneration in excess of x amount, would be paid in long term share options. Say 10 years options.
Otherwise vote against. That would give Boucher and the BOI board something to chew over.
If they argued against it would be a pretty open admission that they were going down, and just in it for the money.
What was/is his relationship with Mr Sean Dunne?!
@Patrick, there’s a long established public connection there.
Richie lobbied Dublin City Council on behalf of Sean and his plans for his Ballsbridge/Knightsbridge and Sean describing Richie as “a very good friend of mine”
http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/new-boi-chief-lobbied-council-on-dunnes-dublin-4-tower-plan-26517418.html
We don’t have details of Bank of Ireland’s lending relationship with Sean but Bank of Ireland was named as a creditor in the recent bankruptcy filing
https://namawinelake.wordpress.com/2013/03/31/sean-dunnes-creditors-named/
During the Dail state bank guarantee debate in early Oct 2008
Joan Burton vehemently insisted that the following be written into the legislation;
“there should be limitations on bankers pay and none should be paid more than the Taoiseach”.
How’s that working out for you Joan?
Namawinelake turns a 2013 success story – survival of BOI – into a cesspool of conspiracy, drumming up pre-meltdown fantasies of Ritchies association with the Dunne disasters, and overlooking Ritchies successes in clawing back some of the shareholders’ ‘haircuts’ demanded by Europe to keep Merkel and (the then) Sarkozy in bed.
@Neil Cox
“a 2013 success story” – I think you might need to set your sights higher, if you think a bank continuing to lose money is a success story!
http://www.rte.ie/news/business/2013/0304/371925-bank-of-ireland-reports-loss-of-2-1-billion-for-2/
survival of BOI – ehhhhhh… They got another taxpayer bailout with the ending of the guarantee scheme – so they no longer have to pay for it, but they have an implicit guarantee, having gone from 1 of 6 to 1 of 2 (PTSB doesn’t really count).
cesspool of conspiracy – If you’re playing the “conspiracy” card you’re losing.
“pre-meltdown fantasies” – Unfortunately the Tribune (and it’s archive) has disappeared and the Business Post is paywalled – but Wikipedia has both a less than flattering and highly informative article on Richie:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richie_Boucher
And on the 7th. day he rested?
Are you really saying Richie was instrumental in stopping the EU from disintegrating???
Must agree with “Disillusioned” who quotes Joan Burton of suggesting that the remuneration of CEO’s of banks should not be paid more than the Taoisech.They say (sic) that if you pay peanuts you get monkeys.It seems we would have been better off with Monkeys at €150k than paying the millions to seemingly incompetent people who bankrupted the state.Put Sean MacErlean in charge of the whole banking caboodle and we might see some proper banking practices in operation.
No person in an Organisation supported by the taxpayer should be in receipt of more than €150k per annum.If they don’t like it let them walk.There’s plenty to fill their places.
Anyone know what happened to the Bank of Ireland loan to the IBRC to finance the 2012 Prom Note payment.
It was terminated as of 8 Feb, ’13.
Plse see below:
The Bank notes yesterday’s announcement by the Irish Government that it will liquidate Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (“IBRC”).
As a consequence the Government Guaranteed Repurchase transaction of Irish Government Bonds entered into by the Bank and IBRC on 19 June 2012 will be terminated on a no gain / no loss basis to the Bank effective on the Eurosystem settlement date of 13 February 2013.