LORD Mount Charles yesterday challenged in the High Courts a warning notice he got from Meath County Council that he requires planning permission for rock concerts at his Slane Castle estate.
Lord Mount Charles claims concerts have taken place at Slane Si 1981 and he is immune from prosecution by the planning authority for any concert he might organise.
Mr Philip O'Sullivan SC, for Lord Mount Charles, said earlier this year Meath County Council warned his client that the proposed holding of a concert last
August required planning permission. No concert was held.
Lord Mount Charles later wrote to the council indicating his intention to hold a pop concert on his lands in 1997. A warning notice was served by the county council and the High Court proceedings were brought to review that notice.
Mr O'Sullivan said the issue was whether the use of Lord Mount Charles's lands for repeated pop concerts was part of the element of "existing established use".
Lord Mount Charles, in an affidavit, said each concert since 1982 involved extensive planning, with meetings between himself, the promoters and all relevant authorities, including council officials.
Mr Des Foley, a senior officer in the council's planning department, said in an affidavit that detailed planning meetings for Slane concerts only started in 1992 when the pop group Guns'n'Roses was scheduled to appear.
Mr Foley denied council officers were at all times aware of preparations at concerts since 1981. There had been numerous problems associated with the concerts. The Rolling Stones attracted 70,000 people in 1982, with 15,000 camped in the village environs 200 gardai were in attendance and members of the Drugs Squad.
Some 50,000 people attended the Bob Dylan concert in 1984. On the Saturday night, law and order broke down in the village and a riot took place.
In 1985, Bruce Springsteen attracted 100,000 patrons and violence and riots took place. When David Bowie arrived in 1987 (55,000), a youth was drowned and two were stabbed. Navan Hospital treated 57 people and a Drogheda hospital treated 46. The St John's Ambulance treated 350 people.
Mr Foley said the 1996 meeting between council officials and Lord Mount Charles was solely to deal with planning permission. He believed there had been no definite plans for a 1996 concert. Each concert at Slane was a new development and required planning permission.
The hearing resumes on Tuesday.