Shannon Foynes Port incurs €357,008 legal costs from CEO’S successful High Court action

THE SHANNON Foynes Port Company last year incurred legal costs of €357,008 arising from the successful High Court action its CEO, Pat Keating took against the port firm over unpaid bonuses.

In 2022, the High Court ruled that the Shannon Foynes Port Company pay Mr Keating €373,339 in unpaid bonuses from 2010 to 2017.

Now, the port firm’s 2023 annual report discloses that the €357,008 in legal fees from legal proceedings “relate to invoiced and received expenditure concerning third party legal costs arising from a legal case with an employee where judgement was issued in favour of the plaintiff during 2022”.

In response to the court action taken by Mr Keating against his employer, Mr Justice Mark Sanfrey ruled that in September 2022 a failure by the port company directors to use their discretion to pay the bonus “constitutes a breach by the company of the contract which has caused damage and loss to Mr Keating”.

The ruling paved the way for ex-Dublin Port Company CEO, Eamonn O’Reilly to lodge similar proceedings against Dublin Port in February 2023 and the company last year paid Mr O’Reilly €415,000 in unpaid bonuses.

Limerick law firm, Dundon Callanan Solicitors represented both Mr O’Reilly and Mr Keating in their respective cases.

The annual report reveals that pre-tax profits at Shannon Foynes Port Company last year increased by 14% to €4.8m. This followed revenues dipping marginally from €15.89m to €15.75m.

In his statement accompanying the accounts, Mr Keating states he was pleased to report “another robust performance for the year with strong profitability despite challenging economic conditions and national climate action obligations impacting underlying traded sectors”.

He said that the firm’s two directly managed terminals, at Limerick and Foynes, increased throughputs “resulting in EBITDA exceeding €7.3m for just the second time in the company’s history”.

He said that “significant opportunities exist in the medium to long term for the port in supply chain development for offshore wind and expanding our freight and logistics capacity”.

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Chairperson, Michael Walsh – appointed in March of this year – in his statement said that “the port remains in a strong financial position with a balance sheet worth of €62.9m”.

He said that the port recently completed “an ambitious €35m development of Foynes Port and this is the biggest capital development project undertaken by the port in its history”.

He said that the continued strong performance of recent years has put the company in a position to pay dividends to the exchequer and in 2023, the company paid a dividend of €325,000.

The firm employs 50 and staff costs last year totalled €4.45m. The staff’s short term benefits included €210,474 in performance related pay.

Key management personnel shared €585,822 in salaries and short term employee benefits.