The High Court has struck out proceedings by Atlas GP Limited alleging that residents who supported a judicial review of a housing development had committed maintenance and champerty. Ms Justice Emily Egan ruled on 19 July 2022 that Atlas’s claim was bound to fail.
The underlying judicial review challenges An Bord Pleanála’s 8 July 2021 decision to grant planning permission for 255 homes, a childcare facility and associated works on a site off Church Road, Killiney. The court had granted the residents leave to seek judicial review, and Atlas’s later application to set that leave aside was dismissed by Mr Justice Holland in April 2022.
Atlas relied on a flyer circulated by the Watson Killiney Residents Association seeking contributions towards the judicial review’s legal costs. It also relied on the residents’ solicitor declining to provide details about funders. Atlas claimed the funding came from people with no legitimate interest in the case and sought damages and a declaration, as well as an injunction that would have restrained the residents from taking steps in the judicial review.
Justice Egan said the flyer provided sufficient evidence, for the strike-out application, that funds had been solicited from the local community. But its stated concerns—including sewage, traffic, safety, parking and effects on local amenities—showed that it was directed to residents who could be affected by the development. The court considered that residents in the locality and their association could have a legitimate interest in the proceedings. It also noted that the association had made a submission to the planning board in its own right.
The judge said Atlas had provided no credible basis to infer unlawful funding from the solicitor’s refusal to disclose private information. She found no legal entitlement for Atlas to demand the requested details from a solicitor who did not represent the residents’ association. She also observed that champerty, which involves a funder sharing in the proceeds of litigation, did not arise in this case because the judicial review did not seek damages.
The ruling was based solely on the conclusion that the claim was bound to fail under the court’s inherent jurisdiction. The judge did not decide the residents’ separate argument that the proceedings were brought for an improper purpose, nor did she determine whether the wider dispute amounted to strategic litigation against public participation. Atlas withdrew its interlocutory application during the hearing. The order struck out these proceedings; it did not determine the merits of the underlying planning judicial review.