14 December-January 2014
F
LOPPY-haired RIAI president
Robin Mandal recently wrote to
members expressing his exasper-
ation at allegations of impropriety and
misgovernance at the Royal Institute of
the Architects of Ireland (RIAI). “I am
genuinely at a loss to understand how
there could be even a perception of lack
of appropriate governance at the RIAI
and, in particular, a claim by a director
who resigned that Council ‘have been
unwilling to address properly very seri-
ous matters of governance’”. Mandal
provocatively put the resignations down
to a failure of the six to “get their way” on
policy change.
He also addressed concerns raised
about the RIAI’s finances – the 2013
accounts show a deficit of €480,000
before tax on an operating income of
€2.9m: “It is worth noting that the
Institute’s independent Auditors, BDO,
are on record as stating that the RIAI’s
internal financial controls exceed that
required/expected from an organisation
of the scale of the RIAI. Notwithstanding
this, I have prioritised a governance
review to ensure we are operating to
best practice, work of [sic] which is
ongoing”.
Eoin O’Cofaigh, a disenfranchised and
irritable ex-President (1998-9) of the
RIAI, had complained about the payment
without any tender process of €500,000
to Bluebloc digital, a company 50%
owned by Odran Graby, son of veteran
RIAI Chief Executive John Graby. “None
of us want a Rehab, a Positive Action, a
DSCPA situation”, O’Cofaigh wrote to the
board before resigning. With six others.
After a failed mediation process with the
RIAI executive.
So what is going on in this Royal
Institute?
It seems a lot of the fuss is down to per-
sonalities and the economy. O’Cofaigh
was a particularly thoughtful president,
promoting architecture over architects,
but he has been the most prominent
member of an RIAI “reform group”
campaigning against an amendment to
building control regulations, which make
it mandatory on beleaguered architects
to certify that new buildings comply.
There is a perception that the executive
of the RIAI is perhaps more established
than some of the economically trauma-
tised younger members for whom the
additional regulatory and insurance bur-
den has seemed like the last straw.
However, this onerous imposition is
a side issue in the debate over propri-
ety. What clouds the issue for outsiders
is that the likes of O’Cofaigh and another
prominent resignee, former president
Joan O’Connor – a favourite architect
of Treasury Holdings and boomtime
member of the Docklands Authority, are
scarcely callow nobodies.
The executive has always preferred to
lobby the government behind the scenes
on the Regulations issue and indeed the
Council voted at its November meet-
ing against seeking revocation of the
amendment – but rather for its own
amendment.
The Council of the RIAI – which ‘gov-
erns’ it has 26 members, not untypical
for a company limited by guarantee and
one of the mechanisims whereby the effi-
cacy of NGOs is diminished. Governing
bodies of this size are set up to fracture,
for cabals to champion particular per-
sonalities and employees, and for gossip
and leaks. It cannot be assumed that it
serves the public interest for all deci-
sions and information of the executive
body led by the CEO, to be shared with
the cumbrous council. Pleas to the gal-
lery that financial information isn’t fully
forthcoming resonate but may in fact not
be reasonable.
Perhaps reflecting the clumsiness
of the governance through Council –
which is in fact the board of directors,
the CEO, John Graby, appears to have
been invested with too many, sometimes
conflicting, powers. For example he is
the conduit for complaints against RIAI
architects but also an architect himself
– a clear conflict. It is also bad practice to
expect the chief executive to pursue com-
plaints against those who pay his salary.
And undesirable that he is Director of an
architects’ insurance company which
needs to get sensitive information about
the members who pay his salary.
It seems to be the case that Frank
McDonald, veteran Irish Times envi-
ronment correspondent, whose waning
ecological attentions have long had
a focus on architecture and archi-
tects, is close to some of the gang of
six. Their resignations were reported
on the Irish Times website before they
were announced to the Council at its 4
November egm. Mandal claims he was
“shocked” when he first heard about the
resignations from the journalist “before
I had a chance to see it myself”. It is not
recorded if Mandal regards it as shocking
that he had lunch with the same journal-
ist that day.
As to the substance of the allegations,
it is certainly unusual that BDO signed
off on accounts although the treasurer,
Garrett O’Neill, had not been willing to
approve them when issues were raised
before the AGM in September about the
propriety of the CEO not divulging his
salary, but sometimes honorary offic-
ers in voluntary councils can be more
squeamish than the hard-nosed corpo-
rate accounting fraternity. BDO claimed
not to have been aware of the Treasurer’s
concerns before the AGM but contorted
to suggest that a Governance Review
should be carried out as a priority.
O’Cofaigh opposed such a move.
The six resignees had requested that
Hayes solicitors (the RIAI’s legal advi-
sors) and BDO be present but it turned
out that the request was not forwarded.
This precipitated the resignations.
But no illegality proved against architects’
body. By Michael Smith
Hackles RIAIsed
NEWS RIAI
It seems a lot
of the fuss
is down to
personalities
and the
economy
“