Miriam Lord: Anglo golf day puts Cowen in the rough

An ordinary afternoon of golf, it seemed.

Picture the scene: the guys in their neatly pressed casual slacks and Pringle sweaters, sauntering around the course, shootin’ the breeze and swapping deep thoughts about fiscal matters.

Just the taoiseach and a few directors of Anglo Irish Bank.

Brian Cowen was a bit worried at the time. The national bottom-line was taking a bit of battering.

So he thought it would be a good idea to talk to a few people who were experienced in the whole money thing. They might give him some useful ideas. A few tips and pointers.

As a former minister for finance, Cowen (being a very sociable man) might have been expected to have had an extensive list of contacts to call upon.

But not so, it seems. Instead, a good pal, Fintan Drury, formerly of Anglo, suggested he’d get a few lads together for him.

Funnily enough, Brian says he met Fintan regularly because they know each other for years, but they never talked about bank stuff. Was Cowen surprised when the people suggested by his high-flying mate were all bankers?

It was nearing the end of July, the Dáil term was coming to a close and the taoiseach was about to take his summer break.

Fintan suggested he could kill two birds with the one stone and start his holiday on the golf course while having that discussion he wanted.

In hindsight, it was a perfect match. The economy was going down the tubes. Anglo Irish Bank was going down the tubes. With so much in common they must have had plenty to talk about.

As it happened, then Anglo chairman Seán FitzPatrick and his colleagues had come to the taoiseach’s notice some months earlier, before he had taken over the top job.

He had been alerted to major problems in Anglo’s operation – the share price had collapsed and rumours about Seán Quinn’s massive debts were causing big trouble.

FitzPatrick personally rang the then minister for finance to tell him how bad things were looking. Brian told him to get in touch with the regulatory authorities.

And he didn’t concern himself with Anglo after that. But the rumours about the bank didn’t go away. In fact, they gathered pace.

Conspiracy theories

During his second appearance at the

Oireachtas

banking inquiry yesterday, Cowen took offence at suggestions that he had discussed Anglo’s problems with his golfing partners in Druids Glen.

He doesn’t buy into conspiracy theories that insinuate “contact equals nefarious collusion.”

“It was economic issues. It was nothing about Anglo Irish Bank at all. As God is my witness. And that’s the truth.”

We believe him. It’s incredible enough to be true.

No. According to the former taoiseach there were plenty of other topics they could have discussed. “Employment was on the rise” for example.

Any ideas there for the taoiseach from his playing partners?

There’s something macabrely comic about the idea of Seán FitzPatrick advising on job creation when he must have known his overblown financial institution was about to collapse, leading to the loss of countless jobs – directly and indirectly.

But then again, this was the same FitzPatrick who thought nothing about delivering a speech in November, when the banks were guaranteed, calling for cuts to “the sacred cows” of child benefit and universal pensions.

So Seánie knew that Cowen knew that Seánie knew that. . . And not one person in that golfing group mentioned a thing about the ailing bank. Perhaps the Anglo boys were dying to bring it up in conversation and the taoiseach pretended not to hear.

What we do know is that when the politician and the money men left Druids Glen, the course was in a terrible state.

Greens ploughed up, divots the size of bunkers everywhere, huge dungheaps all over the fairways.

But then, that’s what happens when there’s an elephant in your golfing party and nobody chooses to notice it.

Chaos in Merrion Street

Cowen’s testimony pointed to chaos in Government Buildings in the hours leading up to the bank guarantee. The weeks preceding it didn’t sound much better.

Although the ship was going down, the taoiseach seemed content to leave decisions and actions to others, rather than assuming a captain’s role.

He only contacted one outsider on the night, Alan Gray, who was on the board of the Central bank . He’d been on that golf outing too. Cowen valued his advice.

When the taoiseach telephoned him, Gray never mentioned to him that FitzPatrick and then Anglo chief executive David Drumm had come to see him in his office that afternoon.

This happened a lot to Cowen: people didn’t seem to keep him in the loop.

He still isn’t in the loop, because no record remains of that night in September, because no note was taken. “I’m sorry there isn’t a record,” he admitted.

Then there was the story of the two representatives from the National Treasury Management Agency, who had been summoned to the Department of Finance and had been kept waiting outside the crisis meeting, until they were finally sent away.

Was the taoiseach aware they were present? They might have offered valuable advice?”

He hadn’t a clue they were there. “I wouldn’t have known who was outside the door until they came in the door.”

Amid these charged scenes – “It was an emotional time” – recalled Cowen, it was decided to hold a cabinet meeting in the early hours of the morning by ringing all the ministers and asking them to agree to the guarantee.

Again, the former taoiseach regrets doing this. He feels he should have held a proper meeting at 6am.

“That’s what happens in a crisis. It moves and takes on a life of its own.”

When his government decided to accept a bailout, again, Cowen admits there was “political miscalculation” and “miscommunication” in not informing the public earlier.

He was certainly not served well by his regulators and some of his advisors. He believed “there were sufficient buffers to meet the situation.”

Plenty of old buffers all right, but none willing to move fast and take swift remedial action before the crisis spiralled completely out of control.

As Cowen explained what happened, there was no doubting his determination to do the best for the country he served.

And though there was a lot of waffle and hot air from him yesterday, the situation he faced as leader of the country was an unenviable one.

Could things have been handled better? Could the committee’s hotshots – none of whom had ministerial experience – have done a better job?

Cowen didn’t do a good job as taoiseach. The whole daft episode at Druids Glen goes some way towards explaining it.

If he didn’t ask FitzPatrick and his directors questions, he should have. Given the bank’s difficulties, he should never have accepted the invitation. As for seeking their advice?

In retrospect, “was it poor judgment on your behalf?” asked Kieran O’Donnell.

He didn’t answer.

Of course it was.

“What has motivated me throughout all my political career is to serve my country. I never compromised my political integrity or breached the public trust,” he said in his closing remarks.

Few would dispute that.

But he messed up.