The High Court has revised the questions it intends to refer to the Court of Justice of the European Union in a challenge concerning apartment planning guidelines.
Mr Justice Richard Humphreys delivered the ruling on 10 February 2026 in proceedings brought by Frank McDonald, Dan Boyle, Pádraig McEvoy, Darragh Moriarty and David Healy against the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage.
A principal judgment delivered in December 2025 had proposed four questions about whether parts of the guidelines required strategic environmental assessment, or SEA, under EU law. The court invited further submissions before settling the formal reference.
Following submissions from both sides, Humphreys J changed course on one proposed question concerning non-binding guideline text that planning authorities are legally required to consider but not required to follow.
The judge accepted the State’s argument that recent Court of Justice case law had already made the position clear. He held that a requirement merely to “have regard” to guidelines does not itself limit a planning authority’s discretion or exclude development options, and therefore does not amount to the type of mandatory framework contemplated by the SEA Directive.
That proposed question will not be referred to Luxembourg.
The court reached a different conclusion on the relationship between the SEA Directive and international environmental agreements. Humphreys J decided that the formal reference should retain a general question concerning interpretation in accordance with the Aarhus Convention and should also refer to the Kyiv Protocol on Strategic Environmental Assessment.
The ruling does not determine the underlying challenge to the Minister’s 8 July 2025 decision. Instead, it settles the approach to the questions that will be contained in a separate formal judgment making the CJEU reference.
The court ordered that the reference proceed using reconfigured questions reflecting the conclusions in this ruling.