THE FUTURE of the chief executive of the Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority, Patrick Neary, is a matter for the organisation's board, according to the Minister for Finance.
"I don't ask him to resign," Brian Lenihan said yesterday. "The board has to ask him to resign and they have to face up to their responsibilities. I'm not going to anticipate their investigation - that's not my job as Minister for Finance."
The authority is currently conducting an inquiry into its handling of the revelation that Anglo Irish Bank's former chairman Seán Fitzpatrick hid loans worth €87 million for eight years.
The organisation became aware of the loans in January, but Mr Neary has maintained he was made aware of the issue only when it was raised with him recently by the Minister.
Mr Lenihan says he raised the issue because he was concerned about the size of the director's loans at the bank.
Asked if he would be seeking the resignation if the inquiry found that Mr Neary was aware of the Fitzpatrick loans, Mr Lenihan said that was a matter for the board of the authority when the inquiry is completed.
"My job is to see that the board do their job as in any company where there appears to be staff failure, that they resolve the issues involved and deal with them," said Mr Lenihan, who said regulation must involve enforcement and not simple passive form-filling.
Mr Lenihan said he would not anticipate the outcome of an inquiry by the authority's board.
"I gather there are three officials involved and the inquiry has to resolve different statements that they have made and I'm sure the inquiry will do that. They have given themselves a very short timeframe of three weeks to do that and bring this matter to a conclusion."
The Labour Party has called for a High Court inspector to be appointed to investigate the loans.
Mr Fitzpatrick has claimed that he broke no law - a view shared by the regulator - but Labour TD Joan Burton said there "certainly appears to be sufficient grounds" for the Director of Corporate Enforcement, Paul Appleby, to seek the appointment of High Court inspectors to Anglo under section 8 of the 1990 Companies Act.
So far, Mr Appleby, who has wide-ranging statutory powers, has said no more than that he is "looking at matters" involving Anglo Irish.
Under this section, inspections can be ordered if there are grounds for believing that a company's affairs "are being or have been conducted with intent to defraud its creditors or the creditors of [others]", or if shareholders have "not been given all the information relating to its affairs which they might reasonably expect", said Ms Burton.
She said that section 220 of the legislation allowed for directors to face criminal charges if they "fail to take all reasonable steps" to ensure that "proper books of account" are kept."The public has a right to know what was going on in Anglo Irish and other shareholders or those whose pensions dependent on the bank are entitled to know."
