Rossport Solidarity Camp Face Threat of Eviction

Court Report.
23/07/07

Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp tem­porar­i­ly thwart­ed Mayo Co. Council’s attempt to secure a per­ma­nent injunc­tion at Castle­bar Cir­cuit Court today. Judge Har­vey Ken­ny adjourned the case to next Tues­day 31st of July to give mem­bers of the camp time to seek legal advice. Mayo Coun­ty Coun­cil was refused an inter­locu­to­ry injunc­tion against the camp but an inter­im order was upheld. The coun­cil has under­tak­en to not to act on this order while the case is adjourned.

Ear­li­er this morn­ing mem­bers of the Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp and sev­er­al local sup­port­ers arrived at Castle­bar Cir­cuit Court on foot of a Court Order issued by Judge Don­agh McDon­agh last Fri­day 20th of July. This order cit­ed Ross­port Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp was an unau­tho­rised devel­op­ment in a Can­di­date Area of Spe­cial Con­ser­va­tion.

Eoin O’Leidhin was the only one of the three peo­ple named on the court order present at the hear­ing. Mayo Co. Coun­cil was grant­ed an appli­ca­tion to have Niall Har­nett added as an extra respondent/defendant to the injunc­tion when he sub­mit­ted a state­ment rep­re­sent­ing the camp’s posi­tion. Judge Har­vey Ken­ny put the case back to the after­noon so that mem­bers of the camp could con­sult with the Co. Coun­cil rep­re­sen­ta­tives and their solic­i­tor Michael Browne.

When the court recon­vened, John Kiely JC, out­line the coun­cils case. Mr Kiely stat­ed that the camp has caused “irrepara­ble dam­age” at the site and that the camp was “an unau­tho­rised devel­op­ment” con­trary to the Plan­ning Act of 2000 sec­tion 160. He informed the court that the council’s deci­sion to act was due to a report from Karen Gaynor of the Nation­al Parks & Wildlife Ser­vice (NPWS) and not because of “greater and bet­ter” issues regard­ing the camps par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Shell to Sea Cam­paign.

Mr Kiely coun­tered Niall Harnett’s argu­ment that the coun­cil failed to give warn­ing [of the coun­cils inten­tion to seek evic­tion] stat­ing that “this is a nul­li­ty under sec­tion 3” of the Plan­ning act.

Speak­ing about the res­i­dents of the camp Mr Kiely stat­ed that they were “gen­uine pro­test­ers and con­sci­en­tious objec­tors to progress”. He acknowl­edged the many pre­cau­tions tak­en by the camp to min­imise the foot­print of the camp but argued that had “Joe Blogs been in front of the court he would be treat­ed the same way. He point­ed out that the coun­cil had an oblig­a­tion to enforce the plan­ning laws and that the court “with a heavy heart” had to deal with many trav­ellers in the same sit­u­a­tion.

In response, Niall Har­nett, who rep­re­sent­ed the Sol­i­dar­i­ty Camp, dis­put­ed the council’s claims of irrepara­ble dam­age and that autho­ri­sa­tion of the site was “implic­it in the com­mu­ni­ca­tion and co-oper­a­tion between the camp and the NPWS”. Niall told the court that the camp had car­ried out the rec­om­men­da­tions set out by the ser­vice. Niall referred to an inde­pen­dent impact state­ment that was includ­ed in a state­ment that he had ear­li­er hand­ed up to the Judge. This report by, Bob Wil­son, a direc­tor of Celt – Cen­tre for Envi­ron­ment Liv­ing & Train­ing and the Clare Bio­di­ver­si­ty group stat­ed that he is con­fi­dent that the veg­e­ta­tion would soon take hold again.

Tak­ing issue with the urgency of the council’s action Niall told the court that the camp had just received the papers on Fri­day and that the camp had not time to seek legal advice. He point­ed out that the coun­cil stat­ed that they had expect­ed large num­bers to attend the camp at the week­end but num­bers were rel­a­tive­ly small at the camp over the week­end.

In his argu­ment Niall told the court that the camp had not been con­sult­ed or warned about the coun­cils intent to seek a court order. Niall said, “that although Agen­da 21 had not been rat­i­fied in law… it is coun­cil pol­i­cy” and that con­sul­ta­tion is a prin­ci­ple of Agen­da 21. Niall also stat­ed that the council’s solic­i­tor Michael Browne had accept­ed that short notice was giv­en. Niall then told the court that the order was inap­pro­pri­ate.

Niall request­ed to read his state­ment in to evi­dence for the court but the judge told him that the impor­tant points were made and that it may take some time to read.

Niall accept­ed that the site did not have plan­ning per­mis­sion but told the court “it is a gen­uine claim that we didn’t know” that the camp “was not an autho­rised devel­op­ment”.

Judge Ken­ny sug­gest­ed that there was no get­ting over the plan­ning per­mis­sion bar­ri­er. In an act of good­will Niall invit­ed Judge Ken­ny to vis­it the camp.

John Kiely JC assumed that Niall was mak­ing an appli­ca­tion to adjourn the case and said that he could see the court giv­ing “lib­er­al time” to seek legal advice. He went on to ques­tion the cre­den­tials of Bob Wil­son and reit­er­at­ed the council’s posi­tion that the camp was an unau­tho­rised devel­op­ment.

Niall Har­nett con­clud­ed that the “bal­ance of harm was a test for any injunc­tion” and that the harm to those liv­ing on the camp and would be greater.

Judge Ken­ny agreed that short notice was giv­en. Judge Ken­ny stat­ed, “that they were enti­tled to some breath­ing space” but would not con­cede to Niall’s request to putting the case back to after the courts sum­mer break. Before he rose Judge Ken­ny ensured that the coun­cil under­took not to act on the inter­im court order before the next court sit­ting. Judge Ken­ny adjourned the case to next Tues­day 31st of July 2007 when he will make his rul­ing on the mat­ter.

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