Results 7,541-7,560 of 7,975 for speaker:Joe Higgins

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Thank you, Ms Tinney, and your conciseness I will try to emulate. You were on the board from 2000, 2007, 2008-2011. Could you just very briefly, if you would please, recap the origins and the founding ethos of what became the EBS, formerly the Educational Building Society?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay. But it was set up in its ... set up as an assistance to teachers and some other public sector companies.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Yes.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Yes, okay. Thank you. Why, as a mutual building society, did EBS see it as strategically appropriate to enter the commercial lending market do you think?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay, so there would have been-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: -----there would have been a high consciousness among management, it's a question, that other banks in the Irish market were seeking double-digit growth. And, for example, in evidence here the chairman of Allied Irish Banks referenced Anglo Irish Bank as being constantly put up to them as a model to be followed, putting pressure on them, he felt. Would that be a similar situation?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay. And was there much time in your period on the board allocated to the strategy in relation to commercial property? Was there much discussion on what that strategy should be and how it should be evolved?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay, now the-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Yes. The commercial property loans grew from €460 million in 2001 to €1.7 billion in 2007 and €2.3 billion in 2008 - a 500% increase which by any standards is quite acute. I'm puzzled as to how that tallies against the board minutes of 31 May 2002 when the strategic plans said it would be a question of putting ... well, I'll quote the "Toe in the Water" and "The Toe in...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: It's simply that ... the page is 95 in your book-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Yes.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: You don't really need to go there, Ms Tinney, in the sense that I'm just saying the reference is "The Toe in the Water approach is the favoured one", according to these minutes. I'm saying does that tally with that rapid increase in growth that I outlined?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Yes. If we come forward then and this is starting at page 99 in Vol.1, Ms Tinney, and this is the EBS commercial business plan from 2005-2008-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: -----and if you go to page 101-----

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: -----it would seem that, perhaps, things have ... went forward from the "toe in the water" when, in the "Step Up" strategy, page 101, bottom right-hand side, favours "Grow high margin business in development finance ... Low emphasis on growing current business lines which have low ROC [return on capital]." This would seem, would it, to have formalised a move from the "toe in the water" to...

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Was?

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Yes, okay.

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis: Nexus Phase (29 Jul 2015)

Joe Higgins: Okay.