Background
An Coimisiún Pleanála (the Commission, Ireland’s planning appeals body) granted Uisce Éireann (Irish Water) permission on 11 June 2025 to construct a wastewater treatment plant, pumping station, and associated works at Dunlicky Road, Victoria Park and other locations in Kilkee, County Clare (ref. ABP-321258-24). Six local objectors commenced judicial review proceedings seeking certiorari of that decision. Their substantive grounds allege that the Commission misdirected itself on odour and noise (treating them as matters for the Environmental Protection Agency rather than conditions it could impose), failed to consider the impact of site lighting on neighbouring properties, and gave inadequate reasons on landscaping and amenity protection — particularly in light of its own Inspector’s findings and recommendations.
Before the substantive hearing, the applicants brought an interlocutory application for directions. They sought an order compelling the Commission to provide “a full and candid account” of the consideration — if any — given to the odour, lighting, and screening issues. The applicants argued that without such an affidavit from the Commissioners who made the decision, they would be hampered by the presumption of validity attached to the permission and would face an unfair burden in proving what was — or was not — in the decision-makers’ minds. They relied on the “cards face upwards” duty of candour established in the English Court of Appeal decision R v. Lancashire CC, ex parte Huddleston [1986] 2 All ER 941 and its Irish progeny, including Reid v. An Bord Pleanála [2021] IEHC 362 and Elsharkawy v. Minister for Transport [2024] IECA 258.
The Commission and Uisce Éireann opposed the application. The Commission’s Statement of Opposition identified — with specificity — the portions of its decision and the file material on which it relied to show each challenged issue had been addressed. A verifying affidavit was sworn by a Commission official, who acknowledged she was not present at the decision. The substantive hearing was listed for 17 June 2026.
The Court’s Holding
Ms. Justice Farrell refused the application. She held that granting the order sought would amount to a reversal of the burden of proof and a disapplication of the long-established presumption of validity attaching to the Commission’s decision. The onus in judicial review proceedings remains on the applicant, subject only to very limited exceptions none of which were engaged here, as confirmed in Sherwin v. An Bord Pleanála [2023] IEHC 26, Amariei v. Chief Appeals Officer [2026] IESC 22, and Ballyboden Tidy Towns Group v. An Bord Pleanála [2024] IESC 4. The applicants could not satisfy that burden by compelling the Commission to produce affirmative evidence that its own decision was valid.
The court distinguished the position of these applicants from the applicant in Huddleston and from Elsharkawy. The statutory framework — specifically ss. 34(10) and 146(5) of the Planning and Development Act 2000 — already obliged the Commission to state the main reasons for its decision and to make the entire file available for public inspection regardless of litigation. The applicants had full access to the Inspector’s report, the Commission’s direction, and all associated documentation, and raised no complaint about the Commission’s compliance with those disclosure duties. Unlike Elsharkawy, where the Minister’s Statement of Opposition amounted to a formulaic denial and withheld the basis for a change in legal interpretation, the Commission here had clearly identified the material it relied upon to meet each ground of challenge.
The court confirmed that a planning decision speaks for itself and cannot ordinarily be supplemented or explained by subsequent affidavit evidence going to the thought processes of the decision-makers — a principle applied in Tumblr Inc. v. Coimisiún Na Meán [2024] IEHC 366 and rooted in State (Crowley) v. Irish Land Commission [1951] IR 250. While acknowledging that in exceptional circumstances — such as where the expertise of the decision-maker is directly in issue, or where a respondent relies on a matter entirely within its own knowledge and unknown to the applicant (as in Elsharkawy) — an affidavit from the decision-maker might be warranted, no such circumstances arose here. The applicants’ remedy at the substantive hearing is to draw inferences from the terms of the decision as properly interpreted, including from the significance of any matter left unaddressed relative to the obligation to give the main reasons on the main issues.
Key Takeaways
- The duty of candour (Huddleston: “cards face upwards”) does not, in ordinary planning judicial review, require a decision-maker to file affidavits setting out what its members actually thought or considered; the decision, read together with the public file, is the primary record.
- An applicant cannot use an interlocutory directions application to compel a respondent to produce evidence that effectively rebuts the presumption of validity — to do so would improperly reverse the burden of proof that remains on the applicant throughout.
- The statutory transparency obligations in the Planning and Development Act 2000 (ss. 34(10) and 146(5)) materially distinguish Irish planning challenges from cases such as Huddleston and narrow the circumstances in which additional disclosure by affidavit will be ordered.
- Affidavit evidence from decision-makers may still be required in exceptional cases — for example where the decision-maker relies on matters wholly within its own knowledge and unknown to the applicant, or where its expertise or internal process is directly in issue — but the bar is high.
Why It Matters
This decision provides important clarification on the limits of the Huddleston duty of candour in the context of statutory planning decisions in Ireland. It confirms that An Coimisiún Pleanála (and, by analogy, other planning and regulatory bodies subject to equivalent statutory transparency duties) will not routinely be ordered to produce affidavits explaining internal deliberations in response to a judicial review challenge. Applicants must work from the public record — the reasoned decision, the Inspector’s report, and the materials on the file — and deploy inferential arguments at the substantive hearing rather than seeking pre-hearing disclosure of commissioners’ mental processes.
The judgment also signals judicial wariness about procedural applications that, however framed, effectively seek to shift the burden of proof before the substantive hearing is reached. For practitioners, the case underscores the importance of building an evidential case from the public file at the leave and pleading stages, rather than relying on directions applications to fill evidentiary gaps; and it reinforces that the adequacy of reasons given by the Commission will be assessed against the decision as a whole — including the Inspector’s report where adopted — rather than by reference to what commissioners may or may not have said off the written record.