Plans to move the first residents into the large, planned IPAS accommodation centre at the Thornton Hall site in north county Dublin have been potentially frustrated by an application by local residents for a judicial review.
The application seeks to overturn a ministerial order allowing the work to proceed – as was previously reported here. It was not clear this morning whether work was continuing on the site. What is clear is that there appears to be a tentative move by both local councils and local communities to challenge the placing of accommodation centres on planning grounds.
Westmeath Councillors – initially on the initiative of Councillor Paul Hogan on the Athlone Moate municipal council, but now with the unanimous backing of the entire Westmeath County Council – became the first local authority to enter a challenge. The state has yet to respond to this.
They have claimed that the Ministerial order to proceed with the placing of a new IPAS centre at the Lissywollen site outside Athlone is an attempt to override what they claim is a reserved power of the local authority in relation to the placing of temporary dwellings. They claim that this description applies to the Department’s intention to erect modular homes and tents on the Lissywollen site.
Planning issues were also part of the attempt by persons objecting to the proposed IPAS centre on the former Crown Paints site in Coolock. These were referred to in last week’s decision in the High Court by Justice David Holland. However, they were neither the central issue nor the reason why the application by the three plaintiffs in that case was turned down. They had referred to the Aarhus Convention rather than local planning regulations. Holland dismissed the Aarhus claim.
The proposal as outlined by Townbe is to erect 230 prefabricated buildings capable of accommodating 741 people. However, Justice Holland noted that there has yet been no contract signed with the Department.
Holland elaborates on this later in his decision and notes that while there is no contract in place that Townbe owns the land in question and is clearly intent on proceeding when it is ready to go ahead with the above proposal. The local protesters in Coolock have made it clear that they remain opposed to the centre which as we reported last week will not be proceeded with during the month of November.
Where Justice Holland’s decision is of interest from a planning perspective is that he refers to the fact that Townbe had in March notified Dublin City Council of its intent to avail of an exemption under a provision to avoid normal planning procedures and “to provide temporary accommodation for international protection applicants”.
This has been lodged with the City Council which has accepted the proposed exemption and Townbe’s only stated barrier now to proceeding with the development is the ongoing local opposition and that “it will not resume the attempt unless and until both An Garda Siochána and Townbe itself are satisfied that it is safe to. That is not the position at present”.
What is most interesting is that Justice Holland notes that the only obligation on Townbe was the prior notification to the City Council. He states that “if DCC disagrees that Class 20F applies it could, in the first instance, tell Townbe of its view and, in the second, take enforcement proceedings against the development if needs be – as could any other person.”
Of course, neither DCC nor any other local authority other than Westmeath County Council have chosen to object to any centre on planning grounds. So too now have citizens, including those local residents who have requested a judicial review of the Thornton Hall proposal.
Gript also understands that Councillor Patrick Quinlan of the National Party has submitted a motion to Fingal County Council calling on the Council to “consider the issuance of an Order under S31 of the Local Government Act 1948 to prohibit the erection or retention of temporary dwellings at Thornton Hall, North Dublin.”
The permission for the Townbe Crown Paints site has not been challenged under the same criteria as either Westmeath County Council and now Councillor Quinlan in Fingal. It would, however, appear that this could be done as could similar objections be made to any other proposal involving claimed exemptions for what are described as temporary dwellings.
However, even with regard to the objection made to the Coolock proposal by another member of the public with regard to the Class 20F exemption – an objection rejected by Dublin City Council – Justice Holland said that he was not obliged to make a ruling either on the exemption nor on the DCC decision to reject the objection. Presumably this was because the plaintiffs in this case had not objected on that basis.
Much of Justice Hollands’s written decision was taken up by his response to what he claimed were arguments which do not relate to any legal issues as they are the province of political debate and decision. However, he made it apparent that he takes a dim view of “the Plaintiffs’ irresponsibility in pleading and deposing to those dangerously provocative allegations.”
I would concur with him to the extent that the impact and nature and planning of migration is indeed a matter of political discourse, and it is in that arena that such battles must be fought; and won or lost. Indeed, that is the crucial ground.
However, it is also apparent that there are legitimate grounds for challenging the implementation of the policy in practical terms on the basis of planning and other criteria. The fact that this has only begun to be explored in itself speaks of the dominance and acceptance of a particular view of the policy of siting accommodation centres without their being questioned let alone challenged on such a basis.
It is persuading the elected representatives to do this, and indeed to take a close look at the entire system of accommodation contracts and payments, that is the stuff of politics.