Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent)
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Question 139: To ask the Minister for Finance if he is satisfied that the corporate governance structures at a company (details supplied) where the roles of chief executive officer and chairman of the board are held by the same person are appropriate to a large financial services company providing a range of insurance products here in view of what has been learned regarding the necessity of applying best practice in corporate governance over the decade prior to his entering office; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11762/11]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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At the outset, the Deputy should note that while I have responsibility as Minister for Finance for the development of the legal framework governing financial regulation, the day to day responsibility for the supervision and authorisation of financial institutions is a matter for the Central Bank which is statutorily independent in the exercise of its regulatory functions. I therefore will have no input or influence over the authorisation of the company in question.

I understand however that the authorisation process will take 12 weeks to process from receipt of application by the Central Bank. As part of that process the company will have to be able to demonstrate amongst other things that it will be in a position to comply with the Central Bank's new Corporate Governance code on an ongoing basis which has been designed to address many of the lessons learned over the last decade.