Bid to settle Bula case appears to have failed

MR Michael Wymes and the other plaintiffs in the long-running Bula court case are understood to have turned down the settlement proposal made on Monday evening.

The case being taken against Tara Mines and the State by Mr Wymes and the other plaintiffs continued in the High Court yesterday, with no mention of a settlement proposal.

On Tuesday the case had been adjourned to allow consideration of a settlement offer from Tara to Mr Wymes and Bula. However, when he granted the adjournment, Mr Justice Lynch warned that he would continue with the case on Wednesday if nothing concrete happened.

Mr Wymes, along with Bula Ltd (in receivership), Bula Holding and another businessman, Mr Richard Wood, is suing Tara Mines and the State over the failure of the Bula lead/zinc mine near Navan to come into operation in 1985. The plaintiffs claim the defendants conspired to prevent the mine coming into product ion and are seeking £330 million in damages.

As well as being a defendant, the State is also a 49 per cent shareholder in Bula Ltd, the company which owned the ore body. The State paid £9.54 million for the stake between 1975 and 1978.

The case has been before the courts for three years with the hearings lasting over 175 days at this stage. The case came close to being settled in January 1994 when a reported offer worth around £40 million was made to Bula.

Under the settlement, Tara would have bought the Bula ore body. However, the State is believed to have objected to this, as a 49 per cent shareholder, because its share of the settlement would have been only around £1 million.

The latest offer was solicited from Tara on Monday morning and made that evening. However, the offer appears not to have been sufficient. The Department of Transport, Energy and Communications was refusing to comment last night.

Counsel for the State objected to the adjournment that was sought on Monday, but this is understood not to have indicated any objection in principle to a settlement.

Bula Ltd was set up in 1975 by a group of businessmen including Mr Wymes, Mr Wood and the founder of buildings materials group CRH, Mr Tom Roche, who had acquired the land under which the Bula ore body is situated.

The State was given a free 25 per cent interest and acquired an additional 24 per cent at a cost of £9.54 million over the next four years. the company sought planning permission for a mine in 1979, Tara objected. Tara is owned by the Finnish mining company Outokumpu and operates a lead/zinc mine beside the ore body Bula proposed to mine.

Bula finally got planning permission in 1983 and tried to raise finance. However, in 1985, after negotiations between the partners on an equity injection failed and when separate negotiations to sell the orebody to Tara broke down three banks owed £15.5 million by the company appointed a receiver.

In 1989 Buta lodged the damages claim which forms the basis of the current action.