A judge in the Circuit Civil Court has refused to approve a €10,000 settlement offer to a five-year-old boy, who claimed he developed significant respiratory difficulties because of dampness and the unhealthy state of a previous accommodation.

A former pupil of a Clondalkin secondary school, who dressed up as the Batman character The Joker and set fire to the building, causing more than €1m worth of damage, has been given 240 hours community service in lieu of a two-year jail sentence.