Athlone councillors' legal case due in High Court in coming days

Initial proceedings in the legal case being taken by five Athlone councillors against the development of accommodation for 1,000 male asylum seekers are expected to come before the High Court within the next week.

The five Athlone-area councillors on Westmeath County Council are seeking to bring a judicial review of the Section 181 order which was issued by the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Roderic O'Gorman, in order to commence site works for the development in Lissywollen last month.

As part of the process, the councillors are applying for interlocutory injunctive relief in a bid to bring the site works to a stop, pending the completion of any judicial review proceedings.

Athlone Mayor Frankie Keena, one of the the five local representatives on whose behalf the legal action is being taken, told the Westmeath Independent on Monday evening that the judicial review papers had been issued and that the "return date" listed for the case was Monday next, December 2.

Councillors Keena, John Dolan, Paul Hogan, Kevin 'Boxer' Moran and Aengus O’Rourke are challenging the controversial development on environmental grounds.

As of today (Friday), a GoFundMe page to help pay the costs of the councillors' legal action had raised over €42,000, from 881 individual donations.

At a press briefing in the Shamrock Lodge Hotel last week, a statement was read out from the councillors which accused Minister O'Gorman of being dismissive of environmental considerations at the Athlone site.

"The Lissywollen proposed development is a huge project, it is complex in scale - and delivery would and should involve very many considerations from fire, environmental, public health, energy, water, local infrastructure, local services, local amenities, etc," said the councillors' statement.

"These considerations have not been properly addressed. Roderic O'Gorman is not competent, experienced, knowledgeable or qualified in the above-mentioned areas.

"He has made broad, from-the-hip, declarations and determinations in his order. Therefore, his authority and bona fides in this matter are totally undermined and discredited.

"His order was casual and careless in relation to all environmental considerations but in particular the need for proper environmental screening to be carried out – he simply dismissed the need for detailed, meaningful environmental reports."

The statement also accused the Minister of "dismissing the views of the community and delivering a severe blow to local democracy by dismissing and totally disregarding the views and concerns of local elected councillors".

The statement also said that the councillors' legal team had been in correspondence with Minister O'Gorman "insisting that he immediately stops the works at Lissywollen, given that his section 181 Order is unlawful," but that the Minister had missed two deadlines which they had given for stopping the work on site.

"On each of these two deadlines the Minister, through the Chief State Solicitor, Maria Browne, wrote to us asking for more time to consider the extensive details in our original correspondence to him.

"The situation is now too serious for us to allow the Minister any more time, he has had ample time," remarked the statement which was read out by Cllr Aengus O'Rourke.

"Work is happening at pace at the Lissywollen site, and we are determined to stop it."

The High Court challenge which is being taken has parallels with a recent legal action over plans to accommodate up to 1,000 international protection applicants at a site in Thornton Hall in north county Dublin.

The Athlone councillors have engaged the services of PB Cunningham & Company solicitors, in Dublin - the same firm which acted on behalf of the local residents at Thornton Hall.

Following the legal challenge over Thornton Hall, Minister O'Gorman revoked his order providing for that development, but his Department said a new order for this site would be "developed in the coming weeks".

In a separate, but parallel, process involving the Athlone councillors, they recently issued a Prohibition Order which sought to block the erection of the temporary dwellings at Lissywollen by using a piece of legislation from 1948, The Sanitary Services Act.

Under this legislation anybody who is "aggrieved" by the Prohibition Order has fourteen days in which they can make an application to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage looking to have it annulled.

On Thursday last, it emerged that Minister O'Gorman had called on the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage to annul the Prohibition Order issued by the Athlone Moate Municipal District.

The Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage now has the authority to annul, confirm or vary the order issued by the Municipal District - though the legislation does not specify any timeframe in which this decision must be made.

A statement from the Athlone councillors said Minister O'Gorman had taken "a very aggressive, heavy-handed and undemocratic step" in seeking to have the Prohibition Order quashed.

"We are dealing with this matter and will be making a strong case to the Minister for Local Government not to accede to Minister O'Gorman's application for annulment," said the Athlone councillors.