The High Court has dismissed a challenge by Friends of the Irish Environment Company Limited by Guarantee and SMTW Environmental Designated Activity Company to a ministerial direction removing a noise insulation objective from the Fingal Development Plan.
The objective, adopted by Fingal County Council in February 2023, said the proposed insulation scheme was inadequate and called for schemes operated by daa to cover areas exposed to 40 dB Lnight or higher. The Minister of State for Local Government and Planning directed the council in July 2023 to delete the amended text. The applicants sought judicial review of that direction.
The applicants argued, among other grounds, that errors in the draft direction and public notice undermined the process and public participation. They also disputed the Minister’s conclusion that the objective conflicted with the statutory framework for managing aircraft noise and National Planning Objective 65. The applicants withdrew several other grounds, including the constitutional challenge to the Minister’s powers and the substantive environmental assessment ground; an argument about reasons on strategic environmental assessment remained.
Mr Justice Humphreys found that there had been drafting errors in documents prepared by the Office of the Planning Regulator and the Minister. But he said the errors were not material: the objections applied to both the original and modified versions of the plan wording, and there was no real doubt about the text the Minister intended to remove. He also found the direction’s reference to an earlier chief executive report did not invalidate it, because the report was broadly consistent with the later one.
On the central issue, the judge held it was reasonably open to the Minister to find the plan objective inconsistent with National Planning Objective 65. He said that objective supports the environmental noise rules through noise action plans, while the Dublin Airport plan addressed aircraft noise through the statutory regime and the “Balanced Approach”. The Minister could lawfully conclude that the council’s development plan wording conflicted with those processes. The applicants had not shown that this evaluative judgment fell outside the range of legitimate planning judgment.
The judgment emphasised the limits of the decision. The wording in the development plan was “fairly symbolic” and its removal did not itself remove protections for residents or decide whether existing insulation schemes should be improved. The court was deciding only whether the applicants’ grounds justified quashing the Minister’s direction.
The proceedings were dismissed. The court directed that, unless a party applies otherwise by written submission within 14 days, the order be perfected on the basis of no order as to costs. The matter was listed for 4 November 2024 to confirm that order.