Enoch Burke fails in legal bid to stop panel on his dismissal from school

Enoch Burke

The High Court has refused an application to defer an oral hearing of jailed anti-transgender teacher Enoch Burke’s appeal against his dismissal from Wilson’s Hospital School in Westmeath.

Mr Justice Micheál O’Connell turned down Mr Burke’s application that a disciplinary appeals panel, due to hear his appeal against dismissal, should be deferred pending the outcome of his application to the Court of Appeal (CoA) for a late hearing of his appeal against a High Court decision of 2023.

That 2023 decision was where the court found that his suspension from Wilson’s Hospital was lawful and it also imposed a permanent injunction restraining him from trespassing on the school. Despite that, he has repeatedly disobeyed it and other orders that he not trespass and has now spent more than 650 days in prison for contempt of court and remains there.

The case arises out of his refusal to obey an instruction from the then school principal in 2022 to address a pupil by a new name and by the they/them pronouns. 

He claims that was a breach of his constitutional rights to religious freedom and freedom of speech. 

He did not appeal the 2023 High Court decision and time ran out to do so. As a result, he had to apply to the CoA for an extension of time to be allowed to appeal. On Wednesday, the three-judge CoA reserved its decision on that application.

On Thursday, he asked Mr Justice Brian Cregan to hear his application for an order to defer Friday’s scheduled DAP hearing pending the outcome of the CoA case.

However, he first asked that his application be heard by another judge because he said Mr Justice Cregan was guilty of objective bias given comments he had made in two previous judgments dealing with his case.

Mr Justice Cregan rejected his claims of objective bias but said that justice not only needs to be done but seen to be done. He therefore would not hear the case, recused himself, and said Mr Justice O’Connell had agreed to hear it in the afternoon.

Among his arguments before Mr Justice O’Connell, Mr Burke said that the issue the CoA is dealing with - the validity of the 2022 instruction by the school principal about how to address a student - would also be central to the deliberations of the DAP.

There was also the fact that the DAP had said it would have to have regard to High Court findings which include the 2023 decision that his suspension was lawful on the basis of his refusal to obey the principal’s instruction in 2022.

He also said the injunction deferring the DAP should be granted because there was a fair issue to be tried and the balance of justice favoured granting it.

Padraic Lyons SC, for the DAP, opposed the injunction and said the DAP, which has been delayed due to Mr Burke’s repeated legal challenges, should be allowed to do its work.

If there was any legal defect in the DAP’s decision, it would always be open to Mr Burke to seek a remedy through the courts, he said.

He also said the injunction application should be rejected because of the delay in bringing it as he had done just two days before the DAP was scheduled to sit even though he was told the date on March 26.

Ruling against Mr Burke, Mr Justice O’Connell said he was satisfied there had not been any arguable case made that the DAP hearing should be deferred pending the outcome of the CoA matter.

He also awarded costs against Mr Burke.