FINGLETON CAN KEEP WATCH IF HE RETURNS €1M BONUS - KENNY

Posted on August 5, 2011 4:18 PM   |   Permanent Link   

Dublin North East Labour Party TD Seán Kenny commented this weekend on the issue of Michael Fingleton's €1m bonus and the €11,500 watch he received from the State-guaranteed institution on his retirement in April 2009.

"Michael Fingleton, the former chief executive of Irish Nationwide, has failed to repay a €1 million bonus to the building society, over two years after he made an undertaking to do so. It is outrageous that he has still to do so and I call on him to explain the reasons why.

"I was also very interested to read of the new story concerning his retirement present of a watch. There is some comment saying that the current board of Anglo are trying to recover some amount of money from this watch, but I would like to suggest that instead of recovering the watch or some value for the watch, that Mr. Fingleton can keep the watch on the condition that he returns the €1m bonus to the State.

"I think this is a reasonable suggestion to make - the watch, while valuable in and of itself, is worth nowhere near the amount of the €1m bonus - I think that the most amount of money that can be recovered should be recovered, and as Mr. Fingleton has already said he was going to return the bonus, that is where the focus should be."