Owners of pub deny racism in licence appeal

A Dublin pub which lost its licence after it was accused of barring a woman on grounds of race has appealed the decision. The owners of the Tara Tavern in Finglas have denied accusations of racism and blamed the historic decision of the District Court on Thursday on an administrative mix-up.

However, Ms Teresa Lynch, a 34-year-old black woman from Ballymun, who made the successful objection after she was refused entry to the pub last March, stood by her story.

"I gave them every opportunity to say they had made a mistake, but they never even offered to apologise."

Ms Lynch said she had been "devastated and disgusted" when the pub refused her entry on March 9th.

Her solicitors had written twice to the pub but did not receive a reply.

Judge Thomas Fitzpatrick supported her claim at Thursday's court hearing. No one appeared on behalf of the pub.

In a statement issued yesterday through his solicitor, Mr Sean Payne, the pub licensee, said he was "shocked" by the "utterly unfounded" allegations. "The Tara Tavern wishes to state that at no time has race, colour, creed or sex been a determining factor in the refusal of service to anyone."

Asked why Ms Lynch had been refused entry, Mr Payne and his solicitor, Mr Richard Bennett, made conflicting allegations about the incident.

According to the statement, the objection made by Ms Lynch had made no mention of racism. As far as the pub was concerned, the licence had been renewed at a District Court hearing on September 24th last, at which Ms Lynch was not present.

The pub management was unaware of this week's hearing at which the licence renewal was denied.

However, court sources confirmed yesterday that the decision made in September was to adjourn the case, rather than to renew the licence then. Ms Lynch said she did attend the first hearing, though she arrived late.

Ms Lynch was born and raised in Dublin. She says she always suffered some racism; however, things had got much worse since asylum-seekers started arriving in larger numbers over the past few years.