The High Court refused an application by University College Cork lecturer Dylan Evans for discovery of two categories of documents in judicial review proceedings challenging university recommendations concerning his employment.
Mr Justice Hogan delivered the judgment on 8 November 2010. Evans had been granted leave to challenge a recommendation that his conduct be monitored and supervised for two years, and a separate recommendation against his establishment, which the judgment said was effectively a recommendation against long-term tenure.
The judicial review grounds alleged breaches of fair procedures. Evans contended that he had not been allowed to make submissions in mitigation or pursue an internal appeal regarding the supervision recommendation, and that he had not received an adequate opportunity to address the proposed reason for the recommendation against establishment. The grounds also made general allegations of bad faith or objective bias, without particulars, the judge said.
The first category sought was correspondence between the university’s vice president for research and its president concerning the recommendation against establishment. The judge said third-party correspondence would not bear on the pleaded fair-procedures claims as advanced. Its possible relevance to bad faith did not justify discovery because that allegation was general and unsupported by particulars.
The second category concerned material arising from the university’s decision to prevent Evans from teaching a research ethics module while a disciplinary investigation was under way. The judge found it had no relevance to the fair-procedures claim about the opportunity to answer the reason for the establishment recommendation. It could only potentially relate to bad faith, which had not been sufficiently particularised.
The court therefore declined to order discovery of either category. The judgment addressed the discovery application only; it did not determine the underlying judicial review challenges. A third category, documents between the university president and head of personnel, was not pursued at the hearing and was not considered.