THE Supreme Court yesterday ruled by a three to two majority that the Commissioners of Irish Lights do not have the power to erect a radio mast at Loop Head Co Clare.
The majority verdict was that the proposed Loran C system provided an aid to navigation to both ships and aircraft and therefore extended far beyond the area of the Commissioners as provided for in legislation.
The intention of the legislature was that the navigational aid for the guidance of ships in the area of the responsibility of the Commissioners provided by the erection and placing of lighthouses would be visual, by the provision of lights, and aural, by fog horns.
The Loran C system was designed to enable ships and aircraft to pin point their position at sea or in the air and not for the purpose of providing guidance to mariners approaching land or providing warning to them of the vicinity of land as was the purpose of the Act.
The Chief Justice, Mr Justice Hamilton, Mr Justice Blayney and Mr Justice Barrington dismissed an appeal by the Commissioners against a High Court ruling that they did not have the power to construct, maintain and operate certain navigation equipment known as the Loran C system. Mr Justice O'Flaherty and Mrs Justice Denham disagreed.
The Chief Justice said the fundamental issue in the appeal was whether the proposed Loran C mast sought to be erected by the Commissioners was a lighthouse, buoy or beacon within the meaning of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894.
The application for planning permission was granted by An Bord Pleanala on the grounds that the development formed a significant element in an internationally agreed network which was considered necessary for marine navigation.
The Chief Justice said the Commissioners were not given any general power to provide navigational aids. The Loran C system was clearly one which was altogether beyond the scope of the Act.
Mr Justice Blayney said he was satisfied that the essential function of a beacon was to mark a particular place so that such place could be easily identified by an approaching ship. An essential characteristic of a beacon was to mark and enable to be identified the position of physical features on the coast.
In his opinion, the mast as part of the Loran C system could not be said to share this characteristic. The essential purpose of the Loran C system was to enable ships to plot their position at sea and to enable aircraft to do the same. It was not to enable ships to be able to identify the place on which the mast was erected.
The purpose of the mast was to enable signals to be emitted as part of an international system and ships, receiving this signal, and the signal from other masts, could then work out their precise position at sea.
But the ship was not concerned with the place where the mast was cited, it did not use the mast to identify that place, or use the signals emitting from the mast for this purpose, and so, in his opinion, neither the mast, nor the signals emitted from it, came within the definition of a beacon in the Act.
Mr Justice Barrington said it appeared the draughtsman of the legislation was thinking in terms of the technology of the times and what he had in mind was to vest in the Commissioners the superintendence and management of specified aids to navigation of ships approaching or leaving Irish coastal waters.
The Loran C system of long term navigation existed to enable seamen and airmen who may be out of sight of land to pinpoint their position and plot their journey. It was not necessarily concerned with approaching or leaving coastal waters or with avoiding collisions with islands or rocks.
In his dissenting judgment, Mr Justice O'Flaherty said it was asking too much of the legislature to be on the alert to amend old legislation to take account of every new development. In the circumstances, he had no difficulty in holding that the word "beacon" should include radio beacons, including beacons erected for the purposes of marine navigation.
Mrs Justice Denham said the fact that this beacon would give a stronger signal than other types of beacons did not alter its fundamental character. Whereas an Act was drafted in accordance with the time of its enactment, it was presumed to b9 an ongoing Act.