The High Court has given Cathal Boyle liberty to defend a claim by Cabot Asset Purchases Ireland over a personal guarantee for debts of CIM Trawlers Limited. The defence is limited to whether an alleged promise by the bank discharged the guarantee and the amount of any liability. The court did not decide those issues or the claim itself.
Cabot sought summary judgment, saying it acquired the company’s debt and related guarantee from Ulster Bank. The guarantee, dated 6 July 2006, was capped at €750,000 plus interest from demand. Cabot said a demand letter was sent in June 2016 and that €2,384,773.62 remained unpaid on the loan facility.
Boyle said that after the company’s fishing vessel, the India Rose, was sold in November 2008, an Ulster Bank representative assured him that he would be released from his personal guarantee if the vessel was sold to meet the company’s liabilities. He said he relied on that assurance and suffered personal detriment. Cabot disputed that the account established a defence, pointing to the guarantee’s written variation requirements and the lack of supporting documents.
The judge rejected Boyle’s limitation defence as unarguable on the evidence before the court. The guarantee waived a limitation defence, and Boyle had produced no written demand to support his claim that a demand had been made in 2008 or 2009.
The court was satisfied that the debt and guarantee had been transferred to Cabot. However, it was not satisfied that the amount claimed had been adequately established: Cabot’s evidence relied on computer records, without bank statements or account records showing the indebtedness. The judge found it arguable that this evidence did not sufficiently prove the company’s liability, on which the guarantee claim depended.
The judge also held that Boyle’s account of the alleged assurance and his connection to the vessel’s sale raised an arguable promissory estoppel defence requiring fuller consideration. The court did not determine whether that defence would ultimately succeed. It granted liberty to defend only on promissory estoppel and the extent and amount of any liability, excluding a challenge to Cabot’s ownership of or entitlement to the security.