THE TWO senior AIB bankers whose business affairs are being investigated by their employer are involved in dealings with the former head of Irish operations at Anglo Irish Bank.
Tom Browne, a former director of Anglo who at one time was considered the executive most likely to replace Seán FitzPatrick as chief executive, is a business partner of John Hughes, head of business banking at AIB, Eyre Square, Galway.
A spokeswoman for the Office of Public Works confirmed yesterday that it rents office space at Fairgreen Road, Galway, from Mr Browne and Mr Hughes.
The offices are used by the Revenue Commissioners and, according to a reply to a Dáil question in June of last year, the rent on the office space is €941,276 a year. The office development at Geata na Cathrach is a substantial one and there are other significant tenants there.
Filings in the Companies Registration Office show Mr Hughes’ wife, Margaret, and a Diana Browne, who lives at the same address in Foxrock, Co Dublin, as Mr Browne, were directors and shareholders of Fairgreen Block Management Company Ltd, with a registered address at Mr Hughes’ home in Galway. The company was dissolved earlier this year.
Its principal activity was the “management of the common areas at Geata na Cathrach development, Galway”, its accounts say.
Ms Hughes and Ms Browne are also directors and shareholders of Fairgreen Residential Management Ltd, a company involved in the management of real estate.
Documents in the Galway planning office show that applications in relation to the Fairgreen development, including the fit-out of the Revenue offices, were made by the Ballybrit Partnership.
Postings on the websites Property.ie, Daft.ie and Rent.ie list properties the letting agent for which is the “Fairgreen Property Management, Ballybrit Partnership” with an address at Mr Hughes’ home in Galway. The postings include office space at the Fairgreen building, the new Dockgate development, also in Galway, as well as Monksisland Business Park, Athlone, Co Roscommon, and houses in Cliften, Co Galway.
In a letter to the senior planner of Galway City Council in April of this year, Gus McCarthy of McCarthy Keville O’Sullivan Ltd, said they were acting for the Ballybrit Partnership, “owners of substantial properties in the city centre both at Fairgreen and Merchants Row/New Docks. This submission is requesting that higher plot ratios would be open to consideration in the city centre zone under appropriate circumstances.”
Mr Browne and Thomas Hopkins, a general manager with AIB Commercial Banking, at AIB Bankcentre, Ballsbridge, Dublin, are directors and shareholders in Phb Endow, a company incorporated in 2001.
The latest accounts available are for the year to end December 2003, when the company suffered a loss of stg £20,895. The accounts say the company trades in secondhand endowment policies. It banked with Ulster Bank in Belfast, and had a bank loan of stg £747,655 at the year’s end. The company also had dealings with an unnamed partnership controlled by the directors.
The company changed its status to an unlimited company after 2003 and no longer publishes its accounts. It registered mortgages in 2006 and 2007 with Bank of Scotland (Ireland) concerning shares in Standard Life plc.
The personal business activities of Mr Hopkins and Mr Hughes are being investigated by AIB. Mr Hughes had no comment to make when contacted. Mr Hopkins has not returned calls to his office and there was no reply to a call to Mr Browne’s home. A spokeswoman for AIB said it had no comment to make. Mr Browne retired from Anglo Irish in 2007, having been paid € 3.75 million “in recognition of his contribution to the group”.
