The High Court has quashed An Bord Pleanála’s permission for John McQuade Quarries Limited to continue operating a quarry at Lengare, Clontibert, County Monaghan, after finding significant errors in the board’s treatment of the quarry’s pre-1964 use.
In a judgment delivered on 25 November 2010, Mr Justice Charleton ruled on a judicial review brought by An Taisce – The National Trust for Ireland. The board had granted permission on 20 July 2009 under section 261 of the Planning and Development Act 2000.
The board’s decision proceeded on the basis that the quarry began operating before the planning code took effect on 1 October 1964 and had not since been intensified. The judge said the board had wrongly treated the quarry’s registration as establishing pre-1964 use and had equated 19th-century mining at the site with quarrying. He said the material before the board did not establish that the quarry had not been intensified.
The judgment said a quarry’s registration does not change its legal status. The planning authority or board must consider whether lawful use had been established; an objector does not bear the burden of proving the use unlawful. The court also said section 261(7), which requires consideration of a quarry’s existing use in certain applications, applies only to lawful use. An unlawfully intensified operation cannot be treated as an existing lawful use under that provision.
The judge noted that material before the board indicated some pre-1964 activity, including blasting and stone removal by horse and cart, alongside brief anecdotal evidence. He contrasted that with the operation declared at registration: more than 40 lorry loads and over 10 tractor-and-trailer loads of minerals removed on each working day. He said maps and photographs submitted by An Taisce, and factors such as increased extraction and the purchase of additional land, should have been assessed under the law on intensification.
The judgment also found that the board’s reasons did not address the pre-1964 use issue, which had been raised. The court discussed possible exceptional circumstances in the context of EU environmental assessment law but said that issue was not before it and made no ruling on it.
The court’s order quashed the board’s planning permission. The judgment did not itself determine what permission, if any, might be granted through a different process.