Orange faces £2m bill after the outcome of Meteor case

UK telecommunications giant Orange Communications plc is facing a legal bill estimated at more than £2 million following its unsuccessful legal challenge to the decision to award the State's third mobile phone licence to Meteor Communications.

The Supreme Court yesterday awarded against Orange the costs incurred by the Director of Telecommunications Regulation and by Meteor following the 51-day High Court hearing and a 17-day Supreme Court appeal hearing.

The litigation, which delayed the award of the licence to Meteor for some two years, ended last week when the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the regulator's decision to award the licence to Meteor. The five-judge court found there was no evidence on which the High Court judge, Ms Justice Macken, could have made such findings. Several of the judges also drew attention to the length of court time which the case had taken. The Chief Justice, Mr Justice Keane, said this was due in part at least to the absence of appropriate case management structures in the High Court at the time of the hearing.

He noted the Working Group on a Courts Commission had concluded the matter of administrative case management should be within the remit of the Courts Service and said that, if proper case management procedures were applied, there was no reason why the case should take more than 10 days in the High Court and three days in the Supreme Court.

The issue of costs was deferred to yesterday when Mr Gerard Hogan SC, for the regulator, and Mr Paul Gallagher SC, with Mr Michael Cush SC, for Meteor, sought their costs of the hearings in both the High and Supreme Courts, to include discovery and all reserved costs.

Mr Hogan said very serious allegations had been made against the regulator, which the Supreme Court had found to be "wholly unsubstantiated".

Mr Michael Collins SC, for Orange, asked that the costs should not include those incurred when the High Court was determining what should be the scope of the appeal taken by Orange. He also asked that Orange should not be required to pay the costs incurred by Meteor in the Supreme Court. He said Meteor's submissions in the latter court were repetitive of those made on behalf of the regulator.

Mr Gallagher, for Meteor, said he was surprised at Orange's assertion that his client was not entitled to the costs of the Supreme Court hearing. He said Meteor had to go to that court to protect its very fundamental interest and had tried to avoid repetition of submissions. Meteor had sustained very substantial costs as a result of the two-year delay in getting the licence.

After considering the matter, Mr Justice Keane, presiding, said the regulator and Meteor were entitled to their costs, both in the High Court and Supreme Court. Meteor was entitled to defend its position in the Supreme Court, he said.