‘We didn’t break law in tracker scandal’

Ulster Bank defiant as TDs criticise absence of CEO

ULSTER Bank has denied it broke the law in the tracker mortgage row.

However, the bank faced strong criticism at the Oireachtas Finance Committee – where the absence of its outgoing CEO Gerry Mallon was branded ‘disgusting’.

Paul Stanley, the bank’s chief financial officer, appeared before the committee yesterday to provide an update on the resolution of the tracker issue.

He was joined by Elizabeth Arnett, Ulster Bank Ireland’s head of corporate affairs, but several members of the committee voiced their dismay over the absence of Mr Mallon.

When quizzed about why he was not present by Fianna Fáil TD Michael McGrath, Mr Stanley said: ‘As you are aware, Mr Mallon has received another job offer. And I suppose as there is a precedent in this committee of an outgoing CEO, and that’s Questions: Paul Stanley what he is, not attending the committee.’ Mr McGrath said he would ‘put it to’ Mr Stanley and Ms Arnett that the bank’s CEO should be there – adding that committee members would look into the precedent.

When asked by Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty if he believed his bank broke the law, Mr Stanley replied: ‘The contractual view is that it wasn’t broken, but that’s not the issue here. The issue here is it was ambiguous from a customer perspective and created an expectation that they could revert to a tracker.’

Mr Doherty said it was ‘not acceptable’ that the bank’s CEO was not present, while his party colleague Senator Rose Conway-Walsh branded it disgusting that Mr Mallon was not there.

Mr Stanley outlined that as part of phase two of its examination, the bank had identified almost 3,500 customers who are impacted, while 15 had lost their homes. He told the committee that to date, redress and compensation had been paid to 1,214 customers. Mr Stanley said it remained the bank’s ‘objective’ to have everybody repaid by the end of June this year.

It also emerged just 197 customers who were overcharged on trackers had been paid back in January. Mr Doherty said: ‘Just riddle me this: you’ve 200 people working full-time on this issue, 31 days in January. Each one of them can’t even pay back one customer each. It is pathetic what you have achieved over the month of January.’

The Ulster Bank CFO said he ‘does not accept’ that as ‘it is not a case that those staff members were working on that 200’.

‘They are working on the balance also to get us also to the 2,500 at the end of the first quarter – work is being done on that concurrently,’ he said.

Mr Doherty told the bank it had ‘robbed’ customers – and also asked about the number of additional impacted customers it expects to declare.

Mr Stanley said he would not get into figures while discussions are ongoing with Central Bank, but replied that a suggested figure of 3,000 additional impacted customers ‘would be excessive, based on our understanding of where we are with Central Bank’.

‘It’s pathetic what you achieved’