Supreme Court of Ireland Decisions

1. This case is really a battle or skirmish in a war between the Plaintiffs and the Defendants in relation to a major proposed development in Westmoreland St. I think it possibly illustrates the extreme distrust that the developer and one of the principal objectors to the planning have developed for each other at this particular stage.

2. Suffice it to say that the objector, the present Appellant, reached the conclusion apparently that the developer was intending to commence development at the Westmoreland St. site before the validity of his development plan and permission had been determined on judicial review proceedings still pending before this Court. It is possibly because of the suspicion between the parties that the objector did not first contact the developer before bringing an application for an interim injunction pursuant to the provisions of Section 27 of the 1976 Act.

3. When the interlocutory proceedings, which became in effect the substantial proceedings in the case, came on before Mr. Justice Quirke, he having heard the Affidavits opened and having heard arguments, reached the conclusion that both parties to the dispute were acting bona fide, the objector in the sense that he bona fide believed that the developer was about to commit a flagrant breach of the planning laws, and the developer in the sense that he reassured the trial Judge and told him that the developer had no such intention. So that from the Affidavits filed in reply to the interim Order it was clear that the developer did not, certainly at that stage, intend to proceed with any illegal development on the site.

4. The learned trial Judge was satisfied that both parties had acted in a bona fide manner and he therefore accepted that there was no necessity for a permanent or interlocutory injunction and he accordingly refused the relief sought by the present Appellants and ordered the costs of the hearing to be awarded against them. It is of some significance that there was no cross-examination of any of the deponents and the learned trial Judge certainly on the state of the evidence before him, was entitled to decide that no injunction was necessary.

5. The debate has largely turned on what was the position at the interim stage. At that stage the learned trial Judge held that the objector genuinely believed that a breach of the planning law was about to be committed but it is of some significance that the objector, at that particular stage, did not notify the developer before bringing the application to the Court and it appears to this Court, despite the elaborate and very detailed argument which has been ably placed before this Court by Mr. Mac Eochaidh, that the learned trial Judge was entitled to make the kind of Order he did make and in fact it was the normal Costs Order in this kind of case. It appears to this Court that it is the kind of Order the trial Judge was entitled to make exercising the wide discretion that he has in relation to costs and this Court does not feel that it should interfere with the discretion which the trial Judge exercised.