The High Court has refused an interlocutory injunction sought by teacher Mary Becker to stop disciplinary proceedings brought by her employer, the Board of Management of St. Dominic’s Secondary School, Cabra. Mr Justice Clarke said the process could continue under the procedure agreed between the ASTI and the JMB, while giving Ms Becker liberty to renew her application if circumstances changed.
The live disciplinary complaint concerns secret recordings Ms Becker made of Board of Management meetings and other conversations at the school. The school says the recordings raise serious disciplinary issues. Ms Becker accepts that she made them and says she was justified because of what she alleges was a conspiracy by her employers to deny her fair procedures. The judge did not decide whether that allegation was true or whether the recordings amounted to misconduct.
The original challenge concerned complaints by school staff Donal and Bridie Gallagher. The Board had undertaken not to proceed with those complaints for the time being, so no interlocutory issue remained in relation to them. The application before the judge concerned the later complaint about the recordings.
Mr Justice Clarke said a court should intervene in an unfinished disciplinary process only in a clear case, such as where an action has irreversibly breached fair procedures. He found that no substantial steps had yet been taken in the process over the recordings. The next stage was an independent investigating committee, which under the ASTI-JMB agreement could not include Board members. He said he could not assume the committee would be biased, that its findings would be adverse to Ms Becker, or that the matter would later return to the Board.
The judge also said evidence might allow a trial court to infer bad faith by the Board and the school’s head mistress, but that assessment depended on the context and credibility of witnesses. He made no finding on that issue. Nor did he rule out a later court intervention if the process took an irrevocable step inconsistent with fair procedures.
The formal determination was to refuse the interlocutory injunction and give liberty to apply. The judge said the central allegation of bad faith should be heard as urgently as possible, noting that resolving it could affect the running of the school.