The High Court has refused Denis Riordan leave to challenge decisions rejecting complaints he made against three Supreme Court judges who had refused him permission to pursue a further appeal.
Riordan’s complaints arose from earlier litigation over a €5,000 appeal fee charged by the Irish Financial Services Appeals Tribunal. He lost in the High Court and Court of Appeal before the Supreme Court refused leave to appeal in May 2024.
He then complained to the Judicial Council that the three Supreme Court judges involved had engaged in misconduct. His allegations included claims that their deliberations took place in private, that the leave procedure was unlawful and that statements in the Supreme Court determination were untrue.
The Registrar of the Judicial Conduct Committee found the complaints inadmissible. That decision was upheld by the Complaints Review Committee in December 2024.
Ms Justice Siobhán Phelan held on 27 March 2026 that Riordan had not shown an arguable basis for judicial review. She found that the complaints concerned the merits of judicial decisions and the judges’ use of established Supreme Court procedures, matters excluded from the statutory misconduct process.
The judge also rejected arguments that Riordan was entitled to an oral hearing, a public record of the committee’s private deliberations or individual signatures beyond the written determination naming the members. She found no arguable bias, unfairness, irrationality or failure to give reasons.
A separate issue emerged during the proceedings: one lay member of the review committee had not been formally reappointed by Government when the December 2024 decision was made, despite having been told that the appointment had been renewed. The Government later retrospectively regularised the position.
Ms Justice Phelan said that issue might, in properly constituted and timely proceedings, be arguable. However, Riordan never amended his case to raise it despite knowing about it from July 2025. The court declined to introduce the new ground of its own motion.
Leave to seek judicial review was therefore refused.