The Court of Appeal has dismissed a jurisdiction challenge by former Irish Nationwide Building Society chief executive Michael P. Fingleton, ruling that the Central Bank could inquire into alleged past contraventions even though he and the society no longer had the relevant status when the inquiry notice was issued.
The judgment, delivered by Ms Justice Finlay Geoghegan on 24 April 2018, concerned one of three grounds in Fingleton’s appeal against a High Court refusal to quash a Central Bank notice of inquiry. The appeal also raised settlement and delay grounds, which were addressed in a separate judgment by Ms Justice Irvine, with which Finlay Geoghegan J said she agreed. This judgment decided only the jurisdiction ground.
The Bank issued the notice on 9 July 2015. It said it had reasonable grounds to suspect that Irish Nationwide committed prescribed contraventions during a review period from 1 August 2004 to 30 September 2008, and that Fingleton and other named people, as persons involved in the society’s management during that period, may have participated. The notice proposed an inquiry to determine whether the society committed the alleged contraventions and whether the people concerned participated. The judgment records these as suspicions and proposed questions for inquiry, not findings that the contraventions occurred.
Fingleton argued that the law allowed an inquiry into a person only if they were still involved in managing a regulated financial service provider when the Bank formed its suspicion and decided to hold the inquiry. The Bank argued that the relevant status was the person’s role at the time of the alleged contraventions.
The court agreed with the Bank’s interpretation. It held that the statutory phrase describing a person concerned in management was “time neutral” and, read in the context of the Act, referred to the person’s status when the alleged contravention and participation occurred. The court said the law did not require the society or the person to retain that status when the Bank later decided to hold an inquiry.
The judgment notes that Irish Nationwide’s deposits had been transferred to Permanent TSB in February 2011 and its remaining assets and liabilities to the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation in July 2011. By the 2015 notice, it was no longer providing financial services, and Fingleton was no longer involved in its management. The court nevertheless concluded that those later circumstances did not remove the Bank’s jurisdiction to inquire into alleged conduct during the earlier review period.
The court dismissed the jurisdiction ground and upheld the High Court’s interpretation. It did not determine in this judgment whether Irish Nationwide committed any prescribed contravention or whether Fingleton participated in one.