It was "mystifying" how the Office of the Director of Telecommunications Regulation (ODTR) can be accused of bias over the decision to award the State's third mobile phone licence to Meteor Communications when the Office went to such trouble in evaluating the rival bids for the licence, the Supreme Court was told yesterday.

Mr Paul Gallagher SC, with Mr Michael Cush SC, for Meteor, said if the allegation of bias was true, it would mean the ODTR was engaged in "a monstrous charade" in the entire tendering and evaluation process. Both rival bidders - Meteor and Orange Communications - had bought into the process which involved the comparative assessment of their bids and confidentiality, counsel said.

There were three stages in the process - the establishment of minimum requirements for tender; the quantitative evaluation of bids; and the qualitative evaluation of bids.

Mr Gallagher was making submissions on behalf of Meteor on the eighth day of an appeal by that company and the ODTR against a High Court decision quashing the director's decision of October 1998 awarding the third mobile licence to Meteor.