The High Court has refused John Morehart’s application to quash An Bord Pleanála’s refusal to let him appeal Monaghan County Council’s grant of planning permission for an expansion at Abbott Ireland’s Cootehill facility.
In a judgment delivered on 12 August 2025, Ms Justice Emily Farrell found that the Board was entitled to conclude that planning conditions did not make the permitted development materially different from the proposal in the application. She also found that the Board’s reasons were sufficient, despite not referring expressly to an earlier memorandum on Morehart’s leave application.
Morehart owns and occupies Bellamont Forest Estate, which adjoins the development site and includes Bellamont House, a protected structure, and Dromore Lough. He argued that conditions requiring plans for asbestos removal, soil and hazardous-waste management, water protection and construction management materially changed the development and would affect his land. The court noted that his original leave application focused on conditions 4 and 6.
The council granted permission in February 2023 for additional warehousing, laboratory and staff facilities, powder silos, a water treatment plant and ingredient storage. The proposal was not to increase manufacturing capacity. The judgment says Morehart’s submission to the council was rejected as late and that he did not challenge that rejection. An Taisce appealed the permission; that appeal had not been determined at the time of the judgment.
The Board refused Morehart leave to appeal three times. Earlier refusals were quashed and the application remitted. The challenge before Farrell concerned the Board’s August 2024 refusal after the latest remittal. The judge found that the Board’s July 2024 memorandum and decision adequately addressed the application. The March 2023 memorandum remained on the file, but the court found it contained no reasoned assessment or recommendation to grant or refuse leave that required separate reconciliation.
The judge also rejected the argument that the Board relied on an irrelevant industrial emissions licence. The licence’s existence was not disputed before the Board, and planning documents said the expansion would not require a change to it. On condition 4, the court held that it did not require testing and possible excavation across the entire site, as Morehart argued; it applied to soil requiring excavation for the permitted works.
The inspector was assigned to prepare the July memorandum before the court made its remittal order on 29 July 2024, after the Board had conceded its earlier decision was invalid. The memorandum was completed and signed on 31 July. Farrell said the assignment occurred prematurely, but found no unfairness or prejudice and considered quashing the decision on that ground alone disproportionate. She refused certiorari and proposed that the case return to court on 13 October 2025 for any consequential orders.