Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 12 Nov 1998

Vol. 496 No. 5

Written Answers. - Legal Costs.

Pat Rabbitte

Question:

54 Mr. Rabbitte asked the Minister for Agriculture and Food if, arising from the legal case taken by a company (details supplied), he will state the total legal expenses incurred by his Department in defending the case; the total legal costs paid by his Department to the company; the steps, if any, being taken to recover from certain meat companies their share of the legal costs; the investigation, if any, held into the issuing of licences to import meat under the GATT agreement having regard to the finding of the Supreme Court in March 1997 that this company had been the victim of collusion between his Department and a number of beef processing companies; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23105/98]

Minister for Agriculture and Food (Mr. Walsh)

The total legal expenses incurred by my Department in this case to date is approximately £538,000. The legal costs of the State were borne by the Office of the Attorney General. With regard to the legal expenses borne by my Department, the position is that both the High Court and the Supreme Court ordered my Department to recover from the meat processors 50 per cent of the legal costs paid by my Department to the legal representatives of the company from the time they joined my Department in the case. I fully intend to implement this ruling of the courts.

Immediately after my Department was informed by the Chief State Solicitor that the legal costs of the companies had been finalised by the Taxing Master, my Department drew the attention of the Chief State Solicitor to the order of the High Court and the Supreme Court relating to the recovery of costs and asked that the processors should be required to pay their share of the costs. However, the Chief State Solicitor, having received advice from counsel, informed my Department that it was obliged to pay the full legal costs in their entirety and subsequently seek to implement the order against the processors. In light of this advice, my Department dealt with this matter without delay and has paid both the legal costs and associated interest charges to the legal representatives of the company.

I emphasise that there has been no delay on the part of my Department in seeking to implement recovery of the costs from the processors. The position is that, according to the legal advice given to my Department, it was not possible for recovery to be made until such time as my Department had first paid the costs. Immediately these costs were paid, my Department instructed the Chief State Solicitor to enforce the court ruling. I understand from the Chief State Solicitor that this is under way. As far as the case itself is concerned, I want to correct the implication in the question that the Supreme Court found that the company was the victim of unlawful collusion between my Department and the meat processors. This is not the case. The court found that the Department's administration of the GATT beef import quota was not in accordance with EU law.

Following the ruling of the courts, my Department initiated an internal review of the circumstances surrounding this case. This review has found,inter alia, that the original decision in relation to the allocation of licences was made in good faith, even if subsequently found to be legally incorrect, and that while it found fault with some of the administrative procedures employed and deficiencies in customer relations in handling the issues, there was no evidence of collusion.

I make the point that this case was extremely complex and technical. The management of the GATT quota was originally left to the member states and my Department decided at that time to allocate the licences to a range of companies involved in processing beef. The basis for this was the significant contribution made by those companies to employment and value added and the benefits derived from the licences would help to improve their competitiveness relative to processors in other member states. This was entirely consistent with EU legislation. When the management of the quota was centralised at EU level in 1989-90, a dispute arose between the processors and Emerald Meats as to entitlement to the licences. My Department decided in favour of the meat processors. This decision, which was supported by legal advice from the Office of the Attorney General, was based on the Department's interpretation that since the licences had not been transferred to the company in accordance with the procedure prescribed by EU regulations, the company was deemed to have acted as an agent of the processors and the processors themselves were deemed to have imported the beef under the regulations.

My Department has fully accepted that both the High Court and the Supreme Court had ruled against this interpretation and has implemented the ruling of the courts. My Department paid a sum of approximately £463,000 in damages to the company in 1991 in line with the court ruling along with the costs referred to earlier. In addition, the entitlement to licences were restored to the company for future years and licences for substantial quantities have been issued to the company each year since then.