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BreakingNews.ie
2 days ago
- Business
- BreakingNews.ie
Skellig Michael boat trips can resume, court rules
The High Court has given the go-ahead for boat trips to Skellig Michael to resume. Mr Justice Garrett Simons granted an application by the Office of Public Works (OPW) to lift an automatic suspension on landing at the Unesco heritage site and former monastic island, which was also used as a film location for the Star Wars movies, The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. Advertisement The order will allow the OPW to enter into a legally binding contract with each of 15 boat operators who were successful in the public competition for permits to land on the island off the Kerry coast. The landing season runs from mid-May to the end of September each year. Those landing permits were automatically suspended when two unsuccessful bidders brought a High Court challenge to the decision. The OPW then had to apply to the court asking that the stay be lifted pending hearing of the substantive challenge. The unsuccessful bidders, Atlantic Endeavour Ltd and SMBT Ltd, trading as Skellig Michael Boat Trips, disagreed with the OPW interpretation of the legal effect of the automatic suspension. They contended that there are a number of mechanisms open whereby landing permits might legitimately be granted to the successful tenderers for the balance of the 2025 season, while preserving their own right to challenge the allocation of landing permits for the 2026 and subsequent seasons. Advertisement Mr Justice Simons heard the application to lift the suspension this week and on Thursday ordered that it be lifted. He said the practical effect of this order is that it will now be legally permissible for the OPW to issue landing permits to the 15 successful tenderers for the balance of the 2025 season. This will allow for the commencement of passenger landings at Skellig Michael, or Sceilg Mhichíl in Irish. He said his judgment entails no finding whatsoever on whether the outcome of the tender process allows the OPW to confine the right to land passengers on Sceilg Mhichíl to the 15 successful tenderers for a five-year period. Advertisement The proper interpretation of the request for tender and associated documentation, and the legal consequences of the tender process, remain open for debate at the trial of the action, he said. The judgment, he said "goes no further" than deciding that the execution of concession contracts does not result in the crystallisation of a contractual right on the part of the successful tenderers to exclusive landing rights for the 2026 and subsequent seasons. He said the significance of this finding is that the unsuccessful tenderers are not relegated to a claim for certain damages in respect of the 2026 and subsequent seasons. The only right which the OPW seeks to translate into a concluded contract, prior to the determination of the full High Court challenge, is confined to the 2025 landing season,he said. He said he was listing the substantive action for the alleged breaches of the public procurement legislation in July.
Irish Times
3 days ago
- Business
- Irish Times
‘Livelihoods are at stake': High Court to decide this week on lifting of Skellig Michael boats suspension
A High Court judge has said he will decide this week whether or not to lift a suspension on boating permits needed to ferry people to and from Skellig Michael, saying 'people's livelihoods are at stake'. The permits have not been issued while legal proceedings are before the courts in the form of a judicial review of the tendering process. At the High Court on Tuesday, Mr Justice Garrett Simons said he was 'staggered' by the assertion by lawyers for the Office of Public Works (OPW) that it would need six months to prepare the case. He ordered the case would be heard next month and would get 'top priority'. READ MORE The granting of permits to successful applicants is on hold pending a judicial review taken against the OPW by two companies who were unsuccessful in their applications to the government body for the 2025 season, which runs from May to the end of September. The OPW had run a competition in late 2024 to award 15 boating permits for summer 2025 to serve the Co Kerry island, which was chosen as a film location for the Star Wars movies The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. The OPW has said that under Irish and EU law it was precluded from issuing permits for the 2025 summer season until legal proceedings were resolved. Skellig Michael Boat Trips and Atlantic Endeavour Limited both dispute the process underpinning the granting of the licences, alleging it to be 'deficient' and 'without transparency'. They have been granted permission for the challenge. David Dodd, for the plaintiffs, told Mr Justice Simons nobody wanted the boats not to visit the island. He said permits could be granted by the court in an interim fashion and the issuing of a one-season permit was not a 'contract' as contended by the OPW. Mr Dodd said he was resisting a suggested 'five-year framework' on the OPW's granting of the permits as part of a contract, but the plaintiffs also wanted to see the boats out. He said the OPW in applying to the court to have the suspension lifted had referred to a 'contract' having to be in place for the boats to take to sea. There should be no such 'contract' and permits issued were akin to planning permission or a gun permit being granted, neither or which, he said, were 'contracts' nor necessitated frameworks. A permit is a statutory one without an offer or an acceptance as found in a contract, he said. Whether or not this granting amounted to a 'contract' was a matter for the full hearing of the main case, Mr Dodd said. 'We are happy, however, for the suspension to be lifted,' he said. Mr Justice Simons asked Andrew Beck SC, for the OPW, how it was looking for six months to prepare for this 'most straightforward case of competition for licences'. Mr Beck said there was discovery of documents needed, amendments to make and a possible issue around cross-examination. The judge said he was 'staggered' the case would take up to six months to get on. Mr Justice Simons said he would rule on Thursday whether or not he would lift the suspension of the permits. He adjourned the main hearing to July 21st.
