The High Court refused Dublin City Council’s application for an interlocutory injunction to stop a union picketing ten council-owned apartment blocks in Ballymun, Dublin. The court held that the statutory conditions protecting industrial action had been met, so it could not grant an injunction at this stage. It did not decide whether the picketing was lawful under the separate statutory provision governing where pickets may attend.
The application concerned a dispute between the Technical Engineering & Electrical Union and lift contractor Pickerings Lifts Limited. Two union members employed by Pickerings had worked exclusively servicing lifts at the ten blocks. After a dispute arose over the lay-off of three other Pickerings employees, the union balloted for industrial action and gave the company notice. Picketing began at the Ballymun site on 4 February 2010.
The council said the picketing had stopped lift maintenance and repairs. At the time of the hearing, only two of the blocks’ 27 lifts were working, causing hardship for about 450 families, including people with young children, older residents and wheelchair users. The council later terminated its contract with Pickerings. It said a replacement contractor was ready to start but would not work while a picket remained. The union said it would continue picketing even if the lift contract went to another company.
The union relied on section 11(1) of the Industrial Relations Act 1990, which permits peaceful picketing at a place where the picketers’ employer works or carries on business. The council argued that Pickerings no longer had a presence at the site after its contract ended. The judge found a serious issue to be tried over whether the site still met the statutory test, but said that question could not be resolved on this interlocutory application.
The judge separately considered section 19(2), which restricts a court from granting an injunction where the statutory ballot and notice conditions are satisfied and the union establishes a fair case that it was acting in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute. The council accepted that a secret ballot had been held and that notice was given. The judge concluded that the ballot covered picketing at Ballymun through the dispute, including after the council’s contract with Pickerings ended, and found the statutory conditions satisfied. The union’s dispute with Pickerings, rather than the council, did not change that conclusion.
The court recorded that an interim order made on 20 April 2010 had lapsed and refused the interlocutory injunction. It directed that the substantive action, or a preliminary hearing on the interpretation of section 11(1), be listed at the earliest opportunity. The second and third defendants had not been served or represented at this hearing; the application against them was adjourned generally with liberty to re-enter.