The High Court has ruled that the Civil Legal Aid Act 1995 does not allow companies to apply for civil legal aid or advice. It dismissed a challenge by Friends of the Irish Environment CLG to the Legal Aid Board’s refusal to consider the group’s application because it was a company limited by guarantee.
The judgment, delivered by Ms Justice Niamh Hyland on 15 September 2020, concerned the meaning of “person” in the Act. The group sought declarations that both individuals and legal entities could apply. It stressed that it was not asking the court to order that it receive legal aid, but to recognise its eligibility to apply.
The group had sought aid in April 2018 for judicial review proceedings challenging Ireland’s adoption of the National Planning Framework and National Development Plan. The Board refused to process the application on the basis that the applicant was an organisation, and maintained that position after a review.
Justice Hyland said the Interpretation Act 2005 generally treats “person” as including both individuals and legal entities, unless a contrary intention appears in the relevant enactment. Considering the 1995 Act as a whole, she found such a contrary intention. She pointed to eligibility rules based on disposable income, capital and allowances for personal expenses, as well as the Act’s repeated use of “he or she” and provisions excluding certain group litigation from legal aid.
The court also rejected the group’s arguments based on the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the Aarhus Convention. On the Charter, the judge said there was no general entitlement to legal aid for legal persons; the question depended on whether lack of aid prevented effective access to court. The group had not established that this occurred in the related environmental litigation.
Under the Aarhus Convention, the court said, states must ensure environmental procedures are not prohibitively expensive but have discretion over how to meet that requirement. Ireland’s special costs rules protected the group from adverse costs orders in the relevant proceedings, except in exceptional circumstances. The evidence also showed that it had obtained legal representation and had pursued the judicial review and an appeal. Justice Hyland concluded that the costs did not prevent this applicant from accessing judicial review, so the Convention did not require the Act to be read as covering companies.
The judge also rejected arguments that the Board’s decision should be quashed because the group lacked an appeal or because the Board had referred to a provision concerning group litigation. She found the decision rested on the group’s status as a legal person, which made it ineligible under the Act. The court did not decide whether the group was entitled to legal aid; it ruled that it was not eligible to apply under the statutory scheme.