A publican’s petition for the winding up of the company behind McGrattan’s pub in Dublin is an abuse of the court process, a debt servicing firm has told the High Court.
Judge Liam Kennedy on Thursday refused a request from publican Dan McGrattan to delay Mars Capital Finance’s application for possession of the Fitzwilliam Lane pub, which is close to Merrion Square and Government Buildings.
McGrattan wanted Mars Capital’s case against G-Mac Holdings LC – brought on foot of an alleged €1 million debt – to be postponed until after the appointment of a liquidator to the company. McGrattan, a director of G-Mac Holdings, says his petition is advanced “exclusively in his capacity as a creditor” owed €1.5 million by the company arising out of a €92,000 mortgage debenture from 2011.
The freehold interest in McGrattan’s Public House at 76/77 Fitzwilliam Lane and some parking spaces around Merrion Square are the only assets of single-purpose holding vehicle G-Mac Holdings LC.
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Eamon Marray, senior counsel for Mars Capital, instructed by Healy Pentony Solicitors, said his client will oppose the petition as it is “effectively an abuse of the process of the court”.
McGrattan’s senior barrister, Gary McCarthy, instructed by O’Sullivan & Associates, said the Companies Act sets out that, once a court appoints a liquidator, a company is retrospectively deemed to have gone into liquidation the day the winding-up petition was issued. He said the petition for G-Mac Holdings’ winding up was brought on April 10th and, if it subsequently enters liquidation, any interim dissipation of its assets will be deemed void.
Mars Capital would be caused no prejudice by delaying its possession case, and would actually “benefit”, timewise, by the petition being heard first, McCarthy submitted.
Kennedy said he would proceed to hear the possession case today and tomorrow as it had been especially scheduled for these two days. It was “entirely inappropriate” for the adjournment application to be made on the date of the hearing without legal documents, he said.
The judge said it was an “extraordinary time” for the petition, but he was not determining whether it was an abuse of process. The “chips will fall where they may” if the petition later leads to the liquidation of G-Mac Holdings, he said,
He proceeded to hear the possession case brought by Mars Capital against G-Mac Holdings and the occupants of the pub property – BBB Taverns Limited and Gallery Entertainment Limited.
No representative of G-Mac Holdings appeared, and the court heard McGrattan contends Mars Capital failed to properly serve the company, which was incorporated in Florida in the United States.
McGrattan was not personally a party to the possession case, but there is a “substantial dispute” between him and Mars Capital about whether the debt firm’s charge over the pub property is valid, his counsel said. The court heard there are “competing interests and competing claims” between them, and his client’s charge over the property ranks ahead of Mars Capital’s.
Marray said his client was entitled to serve the company at its place of business in Dublin.
Mars Capital claims its debt, secured against the bar, arose out of Bank of Ireland loans to the company in 2014 and 2023 that it later purchased.
G-Mac Holdings has repeatedly defaulted on repayments and it failed to pay the total balance on demand in July 2024, the firm claims.
In his petition, McGrattan, who lives in Dublin, says G-Mac Holdings has “no effective management presence within the State”, is unable to pay its debts, and should be wound up for “just and equitable” reasons. He sent a letter of demand for payment of €1.5 million last November, but, he claims, this letter “has not been returned” and the sum has not been paid.
