Actor Raymond McBride yesterday failed in his High Court challenge to Galway Corporation's plan to construct a multimillion pound waste water treatment plant and causeway on Mutton Island in Galway Bay.
The corporation is anxious to build the treatment plant as soon as possible because it claims eight million gallons of raw sewage are being discharged every day into the bay.
Mr Justice Quirke, after dismissing Mr McBride's challenge, ordered him to pay the corporation's legal costs. The judge refused an application on Mr McBride's behalf for a stay on his costs order but accepted the corporation's undertaking that it would not seek to execute the costs order pending determination of an appeal to the Supreme Court.
Mr McBride, who lives in the Claddagh area of Galway, had sought an order quashing the corporation's decision of February 9th, 1996, to invite tenders for the construction of the waste disposal plant and causeway.
Mr Justice Quirke rejected arguments made on Mr McBride's behalf that an environmental impact assessment by the Minister for the Marine was required and that the corporation failed to comply with EU obligations relating to the protection of bird habitats.
He said it was freely and candidly acknowledged by Mr McBride, and by other witnesses who testified on his behalf, that the proposed scheme was vitally necessary in the interests of the local population and in the interests of the environment itself.
Mr McBride, said the judge, objected to the location and not to the scheme itself.
The judge said he was satisfied the Minister for the Marine and his officials took a very long time to consider the corporation's application for the plant, made a number of demands on the corporation one of which (a secondary treatment plant) could not be accommodated by the corporation until March 1990.