The High Court refused applications to stay or generally adjourn two judicial review cases concerning planning permission and a waste licence for a proposed waste management facility at Ringaskiddy, Co Cork. The applications sought to await a decision of the European Court of Justice on the compatibility of Irish law with an EU environmental assessment directive.
Mr Justice McCarthy delivered judgment on 18 February 2008. One case, begun in 2004, challenges An Bord Pleanála’s decision to grant planning permission for a development including a waste-to-energy facility, a waste transfer station and a community recycling park. The other, begun in 2006, challenges the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to grant a waste licence for the same project.
The applicants argued, among other points, that proceedings should await the European court’s consideration of the relevant EU law. The judge said the central question had already been decided by the Supreme Court in Martin v An Bord Pleanála. That court held that Irish law complied with the directive and that the planning permission and EPA licence together constituted development consent. It also held that the assessment could be carried out in stages by the two authorities.
Justice McCarthy said he was bound, as a lower court, to follow the Supreme Court decision. He concluded that it left no reasonable doubt about the interpretation of the directive for the purpose of the applications before him. He distinguished cases involving a binding European Commission decision or a pending European court ruling on the same issue, finding those circumstances were not present in the same way here.
The judge also considered the public interest and the potential delay to a major infrastructure project. He said that, if the question were discretionary, he would have little hesitation in refusing the applications. His operative conclusion was that the applicants’ contentions were inadmissible under the applicable domestic and EU procedural principles, given the Supreme Court ruling.
The judgment concerns only the requests to stay or adjourn the judicial reviews. It does not decide the substantive challenges to the planning permission or waste licence, and the source does not state the eventual outcome of those underlying cases.