This story was first published in the Irish Mail on Sunday on 21/02/2010
By: Michael O’Farrell and Philip Ryan
AN EXECUTIVE of Irish Nationwide who had an affair with its boss Michael Fingleton was later given a secret E200,000 settlement in a bullying case against the building society.
Fiona Couse, a one-time captain of the Irish women’s hockey squad, received her payout in 2002 after she took the bullying and harrassment case to the Equality Tribunal.
Mr Fingleton was named in her action and would have been required to give evidence had the society. defended the claim. The tribunal would also have to have been made aware of the previous relationship between him and Miss Couse, Irish Nationwide’s former head of compliance, in arriving at any judgment.
However, the claim was settled privately before such a potentially embarrassing hearing could take place, and Miss Couse walked away with E200,000 .
She acknowledged to the Irish Mail on Sunday that she had had an affair with Mr Fingleton but denied the subsequent case and the society.’s decision to settle it confidentially was in any way related to the affair. She said the settlement had been awarded a ‘significant period of time’ after the affair, adding: ‘And it wasn’t linked to it at all. It has absolutely nothing to do with it.’
Mr Fingleton neither confirmed nor denied the affair but insisted Irish Nationwide had acted properly in response to what was an internal employment claim.
Miss Couse is also understood to have written to the Central Bank and the Irish Nationwide board upon her departure, in which she outlined a number of compliance concerns at Irish Nationwide .
The handling of the bullying claim will raise fresh questions about Mr Fingleton’s stewardship of the society., which might have collapsed without the State’s E400bn banking guarantee in September 2008.
The scale of Nationwide’s bad debts, which are gradually being taken over by Nama, has led to it being labelled a ‘zombie bank’. It is likely to require at least E2bn of taxpayers’ cash in the near future.
Recent evidence has suggested that Mr Fingleton ran the society. as a personal fiefdom and personally approved huge loans to acquaintances without requiring the proper paperwork.
This includes a 107pc loan to former finance minister Charlie McCreevy at a time the society. did not issue 100pc loans, and a E2.5m loan to socialite Cindy Cafolla who supplied no supporting paperwork.
Now the shamed financier is likely to face questions about the way the society. handled the case brought by Miss Couse and the decision to settle it out of court rather than fight it.
Mr Fingleton refused to say if board members who approved the payout to Miss Couse knew of his previous relationship with her.
He said: ‘The matter was settled at the time for good and proper reasons and in the best interests of the Irish Nationwide Building Society, and all matters in relation to this case was dealt with by the chairman of the society. at that time.’
Mr Fingleton, who once studied to be a priest, did not directly address his affair with his former colleague. He remains married to his wife, Eileen, They have three adult children.
Mr Fingleton said he ‘categorically repudiated’ any suggestion ‘that the Irish Nationwide had incorrectly or improperly funded what was an internal employment claim brought by a former employee of the society.’.
He added: ‘This matter was settled at the time for good and proper reasons and in the best interests of the Irish Nationwide Building Society and all matters in relation to this case was dealt with by the chairman of the society. at that time.’ Miss Couse, once a renowned hockey sweeper and one of Ireland’s most capped players, turned out for the national team until the early 1990s, at one point coaching her club.
During her 20-year career with Irish Nationwide, she was one of a small number of senior executives who were close to Mr Fingleton .
Having begun her career in the insurance side of the business, she rose through the ranks to become mortgage administration manager in the 1990s. She accompanied Mr Fingleton to events the society. was sponsoring and was well known as one of his most trusted lieutenants.
By the time she left the society., she had taken over responsibility for compliance, one of the most senior jobs at the institution.
At the time of her settlement, it was reported that her once close working relationship with the chief executive had deteriorated to the point that negotiations had failed to reach a satisfactory conclusion for either party.
When approached by the MoS this week, Miss Couse acknowledged the affair but denied that it had had any bearing on the financial settlement she received. Referring to the settlement, she said: ‘It was a sexual… it was a harassment and bullying action that was taken under the guise of the director of equality investigations.
‘And that’s what that settlement was in relation to. It was in relation to nothing else.’
The payout was ‘based on my entitlement over 20 years’ service’. She denied that Mr Fingleton played any role in deciding the settlement since the matter had been handled by Irish Nationwide’s then chief general manager, Maurice Harte.
‘He wasn’t even involved in it… Maurice Harte was the person involved with it, and the company secretary. And it was unlikely that he [Mr Fingleton] could have been involved in so far as he was a named individual. So he would have been there from the point of view if it was necessary to have a witness or something like that.’
Mr Harte declined to comment on whether the board had been aware of the affair when the settlement was sanctioned, adding only that he had had a frustrating time at the society.
He declined to say whether Mr Fingleton had played a role in the settlement, saying: ‘I’d prefer not to answer that.’ An Irish Nationwide spokesman also declined to comment on a series of questions relating to the affair and also to the settlement .
But Con Power, a board member present at the time of the payout, told the MoS that he was totally unaware of the settlement .
Mr Power said he would not be surprised if the matter had never been raised at board level because of the personalised manner in which Mr Fingleton ran the institution.
‘I resigned because another case which was about to begin had not come to the board. It had never been discussed by the board,’ he said.
‘It’s entirely feasible. Because of the fact that I resigned for the reason I resigned, I’d believe it. It’s quite feasible, absolutely feasible.’
Neither Mr Power nor Mr Harte recalled a letter that Miss Couse is understood to have written to the Central Bank in which she outlined a number of compliance concerns at the society.
During Mr Fingleton’s tenure as head of the society., Irish Nationwide helped disgraced Anglo Irish boss Seán FitzPatrick hide multimillioneuro directors’ loans from the bank’s auditors. Every year, Nationwide lent Mr FitzPatrick enough money to pay off the loans for long enough to keep them off the annual accounts.
Mr Fingleton resigned in April of last year, more than three decades after he had taken over at the helm. He walked away as the sole beneficiary of a E27.6m pension scheme. He agreed to repay a E1m bonus he was awarded in 2008. But as of last month, he had still not done so.
