The High Court quashed Circuit Court orders imposing a four-year driving disqualification on a man convicted of two uninsured-driving offences, because the ban was recorded against the wrong offence and the orders did not cite the statutory basis for it.
The court did not overturn either conviction. It remitted the matter to the Circuit Court for sentencing and for the appropriate disqualification period to be imposed in respect of the second conviction.
The applicant had pleaded guilty in the District Court to driving without insurance on 6 and 11 December 2011. On 27 September 2013, he was fined €100 and disqualified for 40 years in respect of the first offence; the second was marked as taken into consideration. On appeal, Circuit Court Judge Alison Lindsay reduced the ban to four years and imposed a €100 fine on 9 April 2014. She later declined to change the order or refer a consultative case stated to the Supreme Court.
The applicant argued that the statutory four-year minimum for a second or subsequent offence did not apply because both convictions were entered on the same date. The High Court rejected that interpretation. It held that the first offence in time counted as the first offence and the 11 December offence as the second, even though both convictions were entered simultaneously. The latter therefore attracted the mandatory four-year disqualification under section 26(5)(a) of the Road Traffic Act 1961.
The court also rejected the challenge to the Circuit Court judge’s refusal to state a case. It said the power to refer a question of law was discretionary, and the judge had considered written submissions and heard further oral argument before deciding the issue herself. The application for a case stated had also been made late, after she had reached her decision.
However, the four-year ban was recorded against the 6 December offence, rather than the second offence, and the orders did not refer to section 26(5)(a). The High Court found these were errors on the face of the record. Although a four-year ban could be imposed for a first offence, the judge had said she considered the ban mandatory and had not exercised discretion to impose that period for the first offence. The Director of Public Prosecutions’ argument that the defects caused no prejudice was rejected.
The court granted certiorari quashing the Circuit Court orders and remitted the matter for sentencing and imposition of the appropriate disqualification period in respect of the second conviction. It expressly left both convictions intact.