Gilmore squawked as Taoiseach read bank press release

DAIL SKETCH:Deputies hear how there was no alternative to internal appointment in Allied Irish Banks, writes MIRIAM LORD

“AN EXHAUSTIVE search.” Dick Spring was like King Puck – up every reek in North Kerry. He shook every tree in Tralee. Not a stone left unturned in Annascaul. He knocked on every door in the stockbroker belt around Sneem.

Groucho Spring – which was how he was known back in the day when he was tánaiste and leader of the Labour Party – even went to Cork, and other exotic places.

But he couldn’t find anyone who wanted to come to Dublin and run Allied Irish Bank for a salary with a cap of €500,000 plus allowances.

He was the bank’s Prince Groucho in search of an executive Cinderella, scouring the globe for a suitable candidate, hoping to find somebody for whom the €500,000 cap would fit.

No joy. Then he was approached by the financial inbreds who inhabit the higher echelons of AIB. They were more than prepared to wear the cap if it meant they could continue to keep business in the family. They never wanted it any other way, and in the end, they duly got their way.

Brian Cowen and Brian Lenihan, lucky managers of the spanking new AIB branch in Government Buildings, are very disappointed with the outcome. They desperately wanted an outsider to take over the running of the company. But Dick Spring said it couldn’t happen.

Nobody outside of AIB was interested. God knows, he tried. The search was “exhaustive”. Dick, the bank’s public interest director, personally broke the news to the two Brians. We know this because Fianna Fáil backbencher Frank Fahey said so on radio the other day.

Prince Groucho had spoken. Not a word in public, obviously, because that would not be in the public interest. But the taxpayers can take Deputy Fahey and the two Brians at their word, as they did when the pair promised they would bring in fresh blood to the banks. It’s been a little embarrassing for them since Monday, when it emerged that the bank has successfully contrived to keep the old order in place.

But what were the two Brians supposed to do, confronted by an exhausted Groucho and the embedded top brass insisting their search for fresh blood had been unsuccessful? Cowen and Lenihan now toil in a little branch office on Merrion Street while the important decisions are made by the really smart guys above in headquarters in Ballsbridge.

What could they do to deny them? Brian C used to be Taoiseach, you know and Brian L used to be the Minister for Finance. That was before they went up in the world and went into banking. Back then, they did a huge favour for the AIB, guaranteeing their customers’ deposits with taxpayers’ money when the whole company was in danger of collapse.

They also gave the struggling bank a capital injection of €3.5 billion, and just last week, they handed them a present of Nama. As a reward for their generosity, the boys in Ballsbridge put them in charge of their prestigious new Government Buildings branch, with special orders to crack down on the pilfering of paper-clips.

This week, some people around Leinster House have been saying that if the two Brians keep their noses clean, they might even, someday, rise to offices of their own in the Ballsbridge Bankcentre. That’s the building that has the silver sculpture of two splayed fingers rising up proudly from the courtyard.

Listening to Cowen in the Dáil yesterday, he didn’t seem particularly upset that AIB headquarters pulled a fast one by managing to put one of their own men in charge. To the contrary, he read out details of the new top-level appointments in the company as if they represented some sort of victory for the taxpayer. Biffo said the bank’s deputy chairman would be stepping down from his position and “the board would like to express their thanks, eh, to ... him... eh, who will be retaining that role.” It was at this point that Eamon Gilmore would have swallowed his false teeth, if he had any to swallow. Instead, he emitted a strangulated gurgle.

“That’s the bank’s press release!” squawked the incredulous Gilmore.

And indeed, mortifyingly, it was. It just gets worse.

Brian Cowen at least seemed a little embarrassed by this. His mood turned decidedly cantankerous as the morning wore on and Labour taunted him over the press release.

“Will you credit the scriptwriter in AIB?” asked Kathleen Lynch. Biffo scowled.

“What’s wrong with the Labour Party is that they’re disappointed” he sniffed. “They came in here this morning to decide that they were going to lecture us about what was going to happen and what wasn’t going to happen, and in fact, what you’re upset about is that the Government position has been respected, is being respected...” He was referring to the new appointments in AIB and Labour’s original belief that the new managing director was to be paid more than the Government’s cap. But no, Colm Doherty will be wearing the half a million euro cap, despite the bank’s request that he be paid more.

But by this stage, the money was a red herring and the Opposition was more interested in the provenance of the new appointees – suspiciously Ballsbridge Bankcentre. Then there was the issue of governance, and appointing an executive chairman to clear space for the incoming group managing director.

Joan Burton was outraged. She had issued a statement on Tuesday about this sort of carry-on. Had Brian not read it? “I read it yesterday, and once was enough, believe me,” snorted Biffo. “Once was enough. I thank the deputy. I got it in one and it was all wrong as usual. Good luck!” -