The Court of Appeal has awarded Clare County Council its costs of an appeal and cross-appeal in a dispute involving members of the Mongans family and accommodation offered by the council.
In a costs ruling delivered electronically on 20 November 2020, Mr Justice Noonan said the respondents’ further written submissions did not justify departing from the court’s earlier view. Justices Faherty and Binchy indicated that they agreed with the ruling.
The appeal concerned costs in High Court proceedings that had become moot. In its principal judgment on 24 September 2020, the Court of Appeal allowed the council’s appeal. It had concluded that the respondents’ claimed advantage from continuing the proceedings after an accommodation offer in March 2017 was not part of their pleaded case or the reasons given at the time for refusing that offer.
The proceedings became moot after the respondents accepted an accommodation offer when the matter was before the High Court in May 2018. The court’s earlier order made no order as to the costs of the High Court proceedings, except for the respondents’ motion to amend, whose costs were awarded to the council.
In the principal judgment, the court had also expressed the view that the council, having succeeded in the appeal and cross-appeal, should receive its appeal costs. It allowed the respondents to make written submissions if they wished to argue for a different order.
Justice Noonan said the submissions largely sought to reargue the appeal’s merits by maintaining that the respondents had secured an advantage through continuing the proceedings. He described their contention that the principal judgment had not sufficiently considered how the court record was corrected during the appeal as an impermissible challenge to the court’s conclusions.
The court ordered the respondents to pay the council’s costs of the appeal and cross-appeal, including the costs of the recent written submissions on appeal costs. The ruling addressed costs only; it did not revisit the merits of the underlying proceedings.