The Supreme Court has decided that neither side will receive a costs order following Kevin Tracey's unsuccessful judicial review appeal.
Mr Justice John MacMenamin delivered the costs ruling on 23 August 2021. The substantive Supreme Court judgment had been given on 30 April 2020, when Tracey's appeal failed and his application for judicial review remained refused.
The proceedings stretched back to a High Court judgment delivered by Mr Justice Cooke on 20 January 2009. That court had refused Tracey's judicial review application. The subsequent Supreme Court appeal addressed all of the issues raised but did not succeed.
The remaining question was who should bear the legal costs of the proceedings.
The general rule is that costs follow the event, meaning the successful party is ordinarily entitled to recover its costs from the unsuccessful party. On that basis, the respondents would prima facie have been entitled to their costs in both the Supreme Court and High Court proceedings.
However, counsel for the respondents submitted that, in the circumstances, the appropriate and just outcome was for no order for costs to be made.
Mr Justice MacMenamin agreed with that position, describing it as a fair resolution. He therefore directed that there be no order as to the costs of either the Supreme Court appeal or the High Court proceedings.
The ruling deals only with costs. It does not reopen the substantive judicial review issues, which had already been determined against Tracey in the Supreme Court's April 2020 judgment. The court also referred to costs rulings delivered the same day in two other proceedings involving Tracey.