The High Court dismissed the Central Applications Office Ltd.’s application challenging its designation as a public body under the Official Languages Act 2003. Mr Justice John MacMenamin held that the designation was within the Minister’s power under the Act. The judgment was dated 14 October 2008.
The challenge followed a 10 April 2006 notification from the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs that the CAO had been designated under the Official Languages Act (Public Bodies) Regulations 2006. The CAO sought a declaration that the designation was ultra vires the Act.
The court heard evidence that the CAO is a non-profit company limited by guarantee, based in Galway and funded largely through student application fees. It processes and prioritises applications for third-level courses but does not admit students; that decision remains with the educational institutions. The only witness was CAO operations manager Joseph O’Grady.
The court rejected the argument that the CAO fell within the category of bodies performing functions previously vested in a publicly owned or controlled body. It found that the CAO’s central processing of applications was a distinct function established in 1976, and that the evidence did not show the universities had been publicly owned or controlled in the relevant sense.
However, the court found the CAO came within a separate category in the Act: a body on which functions relating to a class of the public are permitted by an enactment or authority given under an enactment. Applicants for third-level places formed such a class. The court concluded that legislation governing universities and other higher-education institutions permitted them to cooperate in administering applications and admissions, and that the CAO’s functions were therefore permitted under the Act.
The court said it was unnecessary to decide broader questions about the constitutionality of the statutory designation power. No challenge to the constitutionality of the Act had been brought. It concluded that this designation was appropriately limited and within paragraph 1(5)(d) of the Act’s First Schedule. The application failed.