Courts

High Court orders squatters to leave Grangegorman site

Group given 21 days to leave buildings where student accomodation is to be constructed

The abandoned industrial premises in Grangegorman which a judge has ordered to be vacated. Photograph: Dave Meehan/The Irish Times

Wed Jul 20 2016 - 19:01

A group of people who unlawfully re-occupied the site of a planned student accommodation project in Dublin have been given 21 days to leave by a High Court judge.

A number of men, women and children have set up home in lands and buildings at Lower Grangegorman and Brunswick Street where planning permission was recently granted for 126 student accommodation units, the court heard.

The same property was subject of court proceedings last year against a group, all of whom ultimately left after one was jailed for contempt of a court order requiring them vacate it.

A company, TSAF 1 Brunswick GP Ltd, bought the property in September, with vacant possession, from a receiver who took the earlier legal action.

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Another group moved in and has set up homes for a number of people in what a local freesheet has dubbed “Squat City”.

TSAF says an associated company has permission to build student accommodation there, along with a supermarket, off-licence and ancillary facilities. An anchor tenant for the commercial area requires it to be ready by no later than May 2019 and it is hoped the accommodation will be ready for the 2018/19 academic year.

Mr Mitchell said there were concerns about safety on the site because the electricity supply appeared to have been interfered with, there was asbestos on the property, and a rodent infestation.

James Keever, one of the squatting group, argued TSAF had no legal standing to bring proceedings because the property was not properly registered after it bought it.

Mr Justice Paul Gilligan dismissed the arguments in relation to the title of the property. The onus was on Mr Keever to show he had a right to remain on the property and he had not done so, the judge said.

TSAF had met the test for the court to grant the injunctions sought, he ruled.

Mr Keever said he did not believe the judge, given because he had granted last year’s eviction order, should have dealt with this injunction. The judge told Mr Keever he was free to appeal his decision to another court.

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