Irish Banking Culture Board

The Irish Banking Culture Board (“IBCB”) was established in April 2019, and is an independent industry initiative, fully funded by the five retail banks operating in Ireland (Allied Irish Banks, Bank of Ireland, KBC Bank Ireland, Permanent TSB & Ulster Bank) with the aim of rebuilding trust in the sector through demonstrating a change in behaviour and overall culture.

The backdrop to the establishment of the IBCB is comprised of heavy public, media, political and regulatory criticism of the behaviour of the sector pre, during, and after the Financial Crisis of 2008/2010 which resulted in the Irish State ‘bailing out’ a number of the retail banks operating in the sector at that time at a cost of approximately €42 billion. However, the key catalyst contributing to the establishment of the IBCB is the behaviour of the sector in relation to the sale, and subsequent withdrawal of so-called ‘Tracker Mortgage’1 products in Ireland. Each of the five Irish Retail Banks has been the subject of a specific regulatory inspection by the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI) in relation to the sale of Tracker Mortgages, which has resulted in significant redress programmes and which will result in regulatory sanctions. In July 2019 2, the CBI reported that lenders had paid €683 million in redress and compensation and over 40,000 customers had been identified as impacted at that point. At the time of writing, just one of these inspections is complete, which culminated in the imposition of a fine of €21 million on Permanent TSB— the largest fine to date imposed by the CBI in Ireland under its powers of enforcement.