The Supreme Court has ruled that Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) could not conclude a contract with Maybin Support Services while a court challenge to the award remained unresolved. The Court dismissed the DAA’s appeal and allowed OCS One Complete Solutions’ notice to vary, but did not decide the merits of OCS’s underlying procurement challenge.
The dispute arose from a competition launched in May 2012 for queue management, lounge management, cleaning, pest control and VIP porterage services at Dublin Airport. OCS, which had held the services contract since 2007, challenged the DAA’s February 2014 decision to award a new contract to Maybin. OCS began judicial review proceedings on 21 March 2014, after the procurement standstill period had expired.
The DAA asked the High Court to lift any suspension preventing it from entering the contract, or alternatively to allow the contract to proceed without an undertaking from OCS as to damages. The High Court ruled that the DAA could not contract with Maybin while the substantive proceedings were pending, although it found that a court had jurisdiction to permit the contract to proceed. The DAA appealed, and OCS filed a notice to vary on that jurisdiction point.
The Supreme Court had already issued its ruling on 31 July 2014. In the reasons delivered by Mr Justice Clarke on 30 January 2015, the Court said that an application under Regulation 8(1) of the 2010 review procedures regulations automatically prevented the contracting entity from concluding the contract. That applied even though OCS brought its challenge after the standstill period and had not made a separate application for an order restraining the contract.
The Court also held that the regulations did not give it jurisdiction to permit the DAA to conclude the contract while the challenge to the award itself remained pending. It distinguished that situation from an application to suspend the procurement process before an award decision, which the regulations allow a court to address. The Court therefore did not consider what criteria might govern permission to proceed or how those criteria would apply to this case.
The judgment concerns the interim question of whether the contract could be signed while the award challenge was pending. It leaves the substantive challenge to the award unresolved.