Legal action against the Northern Ireland Secretary and Chief Constable of the Police Service over the handling of the loyalist protest at a north Belfast Catholic primary school was given the go-ahead today.
The mother of a child attending Holy Cross School was given leave by the High Court in Belfast to proceed with a judicial review of the handling of the long-running dispute.
The leave was given as it emerged the father of one of the children had been on hunger strike for five days in a bid to stop the loyalist protest.
In the High Court, Mr Justice Kerr granted the mother anonymity to protect both herself and her child after he was told she was living in fear and had moved house.
Her solicitors, Madden & Finucane, said the RUC and Secretary of State now had three weeks to file their defence.
The loyalist protest began last summer and resumed at the start of term in September. Every day police have had to mount a major security operation which has now cost in the region of Stg£3 million.
Two Liberal Democrats visited the loyalist protest scene on the Ardoyne Road and Holy Cross school today.
The party's Northern Ireland spokesman Mr Lembit Opik MP, who was accompanied by Mr Patsy Calton MP, called on those behind the protest to end it immediately.
Meanwhile the hunger-striking father was urged to end the fast he began last Wednesday.
Sources close to the 31-year-old father of two, whose identity has not been disclosed, said his fast was "very much a last resort".
The chairman of Holy Cross governors, Catholic priest Father Aidan Troy, who learnt of the protest on Saturday and spent much of last weekend with the man, said he was "devastated" by his action.
Fr Troy said the man's protest was not politically motivated but a personal choice.
PA