The High Court has refused a request by the landlords of the Mulberry Garden restaurant in Donnybrook to postpone the next stage of a commercial lease dispute while they appeal an earlier ruling.
Mr Justice Barry O’Donnell ruled on 14 March 2025 that the landlords had shown arguable grounds for their appeal, but had not established that the balance of justice favoured a stay. The second module of the Circuit Court case was scheduled for 24 and 25 March. The stay application concerned those hearings only; it did not seek to defer the separate costs issue arising from the first module.
The dispute concerns the restaurant premises and the tenant company’s entitlement to a new lease. The Circuit Court had divided the case into two stages: first, whether the landlords had validly forfeited the lease; and, depending on that outcome, issues relating to the new lease. After a five-day hearing, the Circuit Court ruled in October 2024 that the lease had not been forfeited. It found the forfeiture notice invalid, its service invalid, and the landlords’ re-entry on 17 August 2023 not peaceable. The landlords appealed.
The landlords argued that proceeding with the second module could waste court time and legal costs if their appeal succeeded. The tenant opposed a delay, saying it wanted to reopen the restaurant and that further postponement would add to the delay in resolving its claim to a new lease. In affidavits, the tenant’s director said the company had spent just over €387,000 on repairs and improvements. That figure was evidence advanced by the tenant, not a finding by the High Court.
The judge accepted that the appeal raised arguable issues, including the validity and service of the forfeiture notice. He described the landlords’ argument about peaceable re-entry as “very weak”, but said he was reluctant to find it wholly unstateable before the appeal hearing. He stressed that his observations would not bind the court hearing the appeal.
In refusing the stay, the judge said the landlords bore the burden of showing that a pause was justified. He considered the Circuit Court’s reasoned decision after a full hearing, the apparent lack of expedition in resolving the new-tenancy dispute, and the perceived weakness of the appeal arguments. He also found that the landlords’ potential costs if they later won the appeal could be addressed through a costs order; there was no evidence that the tenant would be unable to meet one.
The appeal is to be listed in the ordinary non-jury list on the earliest available date. The judge recommended that the parties could ask the listing court to consider an early hearing, subject to the court’s other pressures. He indicated a provisional view that the tenant should receive the costs of the stay application, but listed the matter for further argument on costs on 20 March 2025. Any costs order on the stay application was proposed to be stayed pending the appeal.