The High Court has dismissed O’Flynn Construction Company Unlimited Company’s challenge to An Bord Pleanála’s 2023 decision on the grounds that the case had become moot after legislation restarted the Residential Zoned Land Tax mapping process.
Mr Justice Barr delivered judgment electronically on 14 June 2024. The case concerned part of the company’s lands at the former Nissan site on the Naas Road, Dublin 12, which Dublin City Council had determined should remain within the scope of the tax. The lands are zoned for strategic development and regeneration, including residential use.
The company asked the council in December 2022 to remove its lands from the draft map. The council determined in March 2023 that part of the lands was in scope. An Bord Pleanála refused the company’s appeal on 17 August 2023. The company then brought judicial review proceedings, and leave was granted in November 2023.
An Bord Pleanála later applied to strike out the challenge. It argued that the Finance (No. 2) Act 2023 had replaced the original mapping process: landowners could make fresh submissions on a new draft map, and could appeal a new council determination. The company had made fresh submissions. The revised process set 20 November 2024 as the deadline for the Board’s decisions on appeals.
The company argued that the central issue—whether its lands met the statutory criteria based on their state on 1 January 2022—remained live. It said the council and Board might reach the same conclusions again, that the earlier map could influence later maps, and that the dispute raised wider legal issues, including the meaning of “vacant and idle”. It also argued that the map’s inclusion of its lands had affected their value and that the timing of a future judicial review could put tax deferral at risk.
The judge held that the amended legislation had set aside the 2023 map process for this purpose and that any tax liability would arise, if at all, under the 2024/2025 map. He rejected the claim that the council was bound by its earlier determination, and said the company could make further submissions and appeal a new decision. He was not persuaded that the case qualified for an exception to the mootness rule, including the exception for issues that might evade review.
The court granted the relief sought in the Board’s notice of motion and dismissed the judicial review application as moot. It said the company could challenge a future Board decision by judicial review and could seek tax deferral while such proceedings were under way. The judgment proposed no order as to costs in the substantive proceedings, subject to submissions; it invited written submissions on the costs of the strike-out application and other matters. The matter was listed for mention on 9 July 2024 for final orders.