Injunctions cost council €90,000

A COUNTY manager has revealed it cost almost €100,000 to secure two High Court injunctions to move on two illegal Traveller encampments around Ennis.

Clare county manager Tom Coughlan confirmed it cost the council €90,000 to move on the two encampments.

“We can’t continue to spend that kind of money in seeking injunctions to move Travellers on. We just can’t do it. To be perfectly honest with you, we don’t have the money to do it,” he said.

Addressing the Clare joint policing committee in Ennis, Mr Coughlan said: “We took an injunction against Travellers in Barefield. That cost us in the region of €40,000.

“We took an injunction against Travellers who were parked on the Ennis bypass – on a relief road – that cost us €50,000 . . . that is €90,000 between the two.

“To suggest that we take out more injunctions – it is going to be very, very costly to do that.

“It has been suggested that bylaws are the solution to this issue. That is a very simplistic view. If bylaws were a solution to the issue, we would have adopted them and dealt with the issue a long time ago and other local authorities would have adopted similar byaws.”

Co-director of Pavee Point Martin Collins said last night the €90,000 council spend on securing injunctions “is unsustainable and not acceptable”.

He said: “There must be a better approach. These are huge amounts of money in getting court injunctions. Are they a good use of public funds? I don’t believe they are.”

Mr Collins said local authorities had “very draconian, oppressive powers” to move Travellers on.