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Kerry Group CEO on the impact of Middle East conflict, AI and drive to keep bread fresher for longer<\/p>\nHotelier Noel O\u2019Callaghan has failed to prevent his multi-million euro business dispute with his sons from going into arbitration after a High Court judge found his arguments were \u201cwholly inconsistent\u201d with sworn evidence he gave in a previous application.<\/p>\n
Judge Rory Mulcahy said Noel O\u2019Callaghan argued that an arbitration agreement with his sons was invalid, despite having previously invoked the same agreement.<\/p>\n
The judge said the suggestion by Noel O\u2019Callaghan that the agreement was invalid \u201cis wholly inconsistent with his sworn evidence in his earlier application in which he sought injunctive relief in aid of arbitration\u201d.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cAt the very least, a party who invokes an arbitration agreement should not subsequently be permitted to disclaim it on factual grounds without some compelling explanation for its change of position.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn this case, the plaintiff offers none,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is idle to speculate on what he hoped to achieve by this volte-face,\u201d said the judge, who commented that the arbitration agreement was \u201cvalid and subsisting\u201d.<\/p>\n
Kerry Group CEO on the impact of Middle East conflict, AI and drive to keep bread fresher for longer<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the circumstances, I am bound to refer to arbitration any disputes between the parties which fall within the scope of the arbitration agreement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The judge went on to say that the reversal of course by Noel O\u2019Callaghan only achieved a delay in the progress of his claim and increased the overall cost of the litigation.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Callaghan (75) stepped back in 2016 from the hospitality business he built over 40 years \u2013 the first hotel his group acquired was the Mont Clare in Dublin in 1984.<\/p>\n
In addition to the five hotels it operates, the company, Saira, owns the Mountarmstrong stud farm in Co Tipperary, along with about 100 rental apartments, owned by S\u00f3 Living.<\/p>\n
He submits he stepped down from the day-to-day management of the group to focus on Mountarmstrong and his horse bloodstock business, leaving the company\u2019s day-to-day running to his sons. <\/p>\n
He claimed that in agreeing to the transfer of his shares, he wanted a \u201cfallback position in the event of any future dispute\u201d, whereby he could retake control of Saira.<\/p>\n
Noel O\u2019Callaghan took the case against his sons, Paul and Charles O\u2019Callaghan, Saira Company Dublin and subsidiary company Sherborough Development Company, who deny the claims against them.<\/p>\n
As part of an alleged 2016 agreement, Noel O\u2019Callaghan was to be paid an annual salary of \u20ac500,000 for the rest of his life, have credit card expenses discharged and receive the benefit and control of Mountarmstrong.<\/p>\n
It is alleged that since 2024, Paul and Charles attempted to exercise control over the bloodstock business with instructions for valuations and sales, some allegedly done without their father\u2019s consent.<\/p>\n
The same year, Noel O\u2019Callaghan sold his interest in the Archers Building on Fenian Street, Dublin, to Saira. <\/p>\n
It is claimed that there was a failure to disclose to him that tenant KBC was negotiating the surrender of its lease on the building, which was sold for \u20ac16.6 million, constituting an alleged material non-disclosure and secret profit.<\/p>\n
When the plaintiff challenged these decisions, his sons, represented by barrister Paul Gallagher, instructed by Dentons solicitors, allegedly began to \u201cfreeze\u201d him out by removing clerical support and cancelling payments to him from Saira, which included health insurance, he submits.<\/p>\n
The arbitration motion was brought by the defendants, which, they say, is facilitated by a clause in the 2024 agreement that saw him step away from Saira but remain with proxy shares that allowed him to vote on their behalf.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Callaghan claimed the 2024 arbitration clause is not operative and of no legal effect as he was never told of its existence and had been misled by his sons.<\/p>\n
The High Court on Tuesday issued a judgment ordering the matter to go to arbitration. The court found that Noel O\u2019Callaghan had previously acknowledged an arbitration clause but had then committed a \u201cvolte-face\u201d regarding the process.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn his first affidavit, [Noel O\u2019Callaghan] averred that the shareholders\u2019 agreement was handed to him by Paul O\u2019Callaghan to ensure that there was an adequate dispute resolution in the event of a dispute between the two brothers,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n
The judge said Noel O\u2019Callaghan submitted he understood that this arrangement would have no effect on his rights in the business and signed off on foot of those representations as a matter of \u201croutine\u201d to be solely applied to his two sons.<\/p>\n
Regarding the dispute over the Archers building, the judge notes, [Noel O\u2019Callaghan] averred that the claims fall \u201cwithin the scope of the shareholders\u2019 agreement. Accordingly, if the claims cannot be resolved on a consensual basis, I will be constrained to arbitrate these disputes with the respondent\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hotelier Noel O\u2019Callaghan has failed to prevent his multi-million euro business dispute with his sons from going into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":435156,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,18,10476,6600,19,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-458828","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-eire","10":"tag-high-court","11":"tag-hotels","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116485431402304615","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=458828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=458828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=458828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=458828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}