Mr Justice Hardiman said the appeal was not concerned with the general rights of Mr Jamie Sinnott or of disabled persons. It raised narrower, but important, issues - whether Article 42.4 conferred a right to lifelong free primary education and what order, if any, should be made regarding Mr Sinnott's education. In particular, had the court power to make mandatory orders formulating the policy to be followed in Mr Sinnott's education and ordering the State to pay for services along those lines?
He noted the Sinnott claim rested on the construction of Article 42.4 and did not rely on the terms of the Education Act, 1998. This was unfortunate, the judge said. Provisions of that Act, together with the Equal Status Act, 2000 and the Education (Welfare) Act, 2000 imposed duties on public authorities which might be relevant to a person such as Mr Sinnott or other disabled persons.
This was not a case where the law had no remedy for Mr Sinnott on the fraught question of what was to be done for him. It was a case where Mr Sinnott was not entitled to succeed in the single, limited avenue which was pursued on his behalf. In particular, recent statutory provisions had effected a "revolution" in education legislation.
It was clear the recipients of education under Article 42 fall into the restricted category of children and not the broader category of citizens or persons. In equating children with citizens, the High Court judge had erred.
He found the duty to provide for free primary education was not open-ended and might extend throughout a person's life. While any age would be arbitrary to some extent, the age of 18 had the merit of being the latest at which a person could, with any element of reality, be called a child.
He was not saying Mr Sinnot was not entitled to have his needs met after 18, but those needs could not be compulsorily met after that age on the basis of Article 42.4.
He had grave reservations about the High Court's jurisdiction to grant orders directing the State to provide funds for a particular education programme for Mr Sinnott. Such decisions were normally for the legislative and executive arms of government. The constitutionally mandated separation of powers was vital.
The fact that powers to deal with extreme circumstances must be retained by the courts could not be a basis for the exercise of such powers in other circumstances.