The High Court appointed examiners to Craigfort Taverns Limited, Kilashee Schools Company Limited and Marchford Limited, but refused an examiner for related property company Faxhill Homes Limited.
In a judgment delivered on 9 May 2014, Mr Justice Peter Charleton considered four applications under the Companies (Amendment) Act 1990. National Assets Loan Management Limited opposed an examiner for Faxhill. The Revenue Commissioners did not oppose any application. Interim examiners were already in place for Craigfort and Marchford.
The court said the likely loan to Faxhill was about €77 million, although its size was disputed. The loan was originally made by AIB Bank plc and later taken over by the National Assets Management Agency. Kilashee, Craigfort and Marchford had given corporate guarantees. The judge said there was no chance of a write-down for Faxhill itself, while a scheme of arrangement might potentially address the corporate guarantees. He said the court did not yet know enough to predict how those guarantees would be dealt with.
The court found grounds to examine Craigfort, which operated Kilashee House Hotel and Spa, and Kilashee, whose land supplied the hotel with water, parking and grounds. The judgment cited the hotel’s reported profitability, bookings and local employment, and said the two companies were interdependent. It also found that Marchford’s Lawlor’s Hotel in Naas was trading well enough to support an examinership. The judge directed that concerns about fire certificates for some bedrooms be taken seriously by the interim examiner.
Faxhill’s case was different. The judge described it as a property holding company that was not developing property and whose assets were worth only a fraction of its debts. He found the claimed links between Faxhill’s land and the hotels, and between its two employees and the hotels’ management, had not been convincingly established as necessary to the other companies’ survival. In particular, the court said the hotels could potentially obtain land or management expertise elsewhere.
The ruling addressed only whether examiners should be appointed. The court said restructuring questions could be considered later. It did not decide whether any scheme of arrangement would ultimately be approved.