The Supreme Court will hear an appeal on Monday against a High Court judge's refusal yesterday to grant an order directing Dublin Corporation to ensure lifts at the Ballymun flats are repaired. After being told of the distress and inconvenience caused to tenants, Mr Justice Smith urged them to take up the local authority's offer to move them temporarily to low-level senior citizens' accommodation.
He sympathised with the tenants, particularly those on high-level floors, but also with Dublin Corporation, which had been frustrated in its efforts to maintain the lifts in the face of a national industrial dispute to which it was not a party.
The tenants had asked the court to grant a mandatory order directing the corporation to take all necessary steps to repair more than 60 of the 73 lifts serving the complex.
Mr Justice Smith said about 6,000 tenants lived in the 2,814 flats at Ballymun, and all of them had to rely on lifts, only a handful of which were operating.
Early last June a dispute arose between Pickerings Lifts, contracted by the corporation to service the lifts, and its employees. Although this domestic dispute had been settled the company found itself embroiled in a national dispute.
Lift companies in the State had entered into negotiations with the Technical Engineering and Electrical Union, but despite extensive talks and Labour Court recommendations the union had rejected a proposed settlement offer.
Mr Justice Smith said some tenants had complained to the court of having been made prisoners in their own homes despite a minimal service which was being provided to keep some lifts operational.
According to Pickerings Lifts, the company had undertaken to keep operational one lift in each tower block at all times and had also promised to fix the lift in any block where wheelchair access was a necessity.
Mr Justice Smith said the courts were reluctant to grant mandatory orders, and while in many cases there were compelling reasons why such orders should be made, there were often special circumstances in which they should not be granted.
"If such orders were made in this case it is highly likely they could not be complied with," Mr Justice Smith said. "The corporation would run into considerable difficulties in getting alternative contractors to carry out the necessary repair works."
There was a real risk that the existing industrial dispute would be inflamed if the corporation was to bring in contractors from outside the jurisdiction.
Mr Edward Walsh SC, counsel for the tenants, said matters remained grave as far as his clients were concerned and he sought a full hearing of the tenants' case early in the new law term in October.
Mr Frank Callanan, for the corporation, said that to facilitate an early hearing he would lodge a defence within seven days of service of the tenants' statement of claim.
A Supreme Court appeal by the residents later yesterday to overturn Mr Justice Smith's judgment was adjourned until Monday morning.
Mr John Doherty, counsel for the corporation, told the court that on Tuesday next both union and employers' representatives had agreed to meet under the auspices of the Labour Court in a further attempt to resolve the dispute.