A row between Fine Gael and Laois County Council over the serving of an injunction on a residents' group in party rooms has been resolved.
Fine Gael last month demanded an apology from the council after local authority staff disrupted a meeting between the Ballymaddock-Rathmore residents' group and party councillors in the county council offices in Portlaoise to serve court papers.
The residents had been protesting at the council's plan to house a Traveller family in a newly purchased five-bedroom house located in Ballymaddock.
The newly elected Laois-Offaly TD, Ms Olwyn Enright, sharply criticised the council for serving the injunction during the meeting, where councillors had been trying to reach "a satisfactory resolution" of the problem.
At the end of the meeting, local authority staff, accompanied by a number of gardaí, served an injunction on residents preventing a protest.
In a joint statement yesterday, Laois County Council said it regretted any embarrassment to the Fine Gael Party.
The statement, issued by the executive of Laois County Council and Fine Gael members, said that following the controversy arrangements were being made to review protocols for the use of party rooms in the council building.
"It is acknowledged and accepted by Laois County Council that the Fine Gael Party had no prior knowledge or any involvement whatsoever in the serving of notices on the parties concerned," the statement said.
It added: "The council officials point out that the alternatives would have posed more problems for them. While the use of the Fine Gael room for the service of documents is regretted, the documents were served in accordance with the law and good practice and without any breach of the peace".