High Court rules no further submissions needed in O’Brien case

A High Court judge has said she does not need to hear further submissions from legal representatives for businesman Denis O’Brien in light of a ruling in the case of former Rehab chief executive Angela Kerins against a Dáil committee.

Lawyers for Mr O’Brien on Wednesday asked Ms Justice Una Ní Raifeartaigh if she needed further information regarding his separate action over utterances made about his banking affairs in the Dáil.

Mr O’Brien’s case concluded in December but Ms Ní Raifeartaigh said she would not finalise her judgment until the High Court ruled on the case of Ms Kerins.

That case was brought over the conduct of two Dáil Public Account Committee hearings in 2014 concerning payments of public monies to Rehab.

A three judge High Court last week dismissed Ms Kerins’ case, which raised some similar issues relating to the privilege attached to “utterances” in the Oireachtas.

Eileen Barrington SC, for Mr O’Brien, said her side had asked to have the matter listed for mention for the purposes of asking if the court required further submissions from the sides in light of the Kerins’ case decision.

The judge said she did not consider further submissions would be necessary.

A date for judgment was not given.

Mr O’Brien’s case, against the Clerk of the Dáil and the State, ran for almost seven days.

Legal costs are expected to exceed €1 million and liability for those will be decided after judgment is delivered.

Mr O’Brien has alleged Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy and Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty “clearly disregarded” the constitutional separation of powers between parliament and the courts when they respectively made statements in the Dáil in May and June 2015.

He claimed the statements, made when he had ongoing High Court proceedings against RTÉ seeking to restrain it publishing details of his banking relationship with State-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, amounted to “unwarranted interference” in the judicial domain.

He also argued the Dáil Committee on Procedure and Privileges (CPP), which rejected his complaints over the statements, failed to “properly police” the TDs over their statements.

The respondents’ core argument was that the court, as a result of Article 15 of the Constitution, has no jurisdiction to intervene.

They argued Article 15.13, which states members of the Oireachtas are not amenable to any court or authority other than the Houses themselves for “utterances” in the Houses, effectively confers “absolute” immunity from suit over such utterances.

They also argued, if Mr O’Brien wins, that would greatly restrict Dáil speech into the future.

Mr O’Brien, the sole witness in the case, told the judge he wanted the court to censure both TDs over their statements and to lay down a line beyond which Dáil deputies cannot go.

Both TDs acted “recklessly and maliciously” and he hoped this would never happen again and his case “will change things for the future”, he said.