Three severely disabled young Travellers are living in "appalling" and "unacceptable" conditions with seven other family members in a specially adapted mobile home on a temporary halting site and are entitled to damages for breach of their rights under the European Convention on Human Rights, the High Court has ruled.
Ms Justice Mary Laffoy held yesterday that Bernard O'Donnell (21), his sister Mary (17) and brother Patrick (14), all of whom suffer from Hurler's syndrome, are entitled to damages from South Dublin County Council for breach of their rights to respect for their private life under Article 8 of the convention.
The only evidence related to measuring those damages was that the cost of a second adapted mobile home was €58,000, the judge noted, and she adjourned the case to next month to decide "how to proceed from here".
"This case is very unusual, if not unique," Ms Justice Laffoy said. "It is difficult to comprehend the level of disability, hardship and deprivation which Bernard, Patrick and Mary endure between them."
Bernard, who is confined to a wheelchair, Mary and Patrick have Hurler's syndrome, a condition resulting from the body's inability to produce specific enzymes which leads to severe abnormalities in development, including visual, hearing and speech disabilities, poor mobility, dwarfism and claw hands.
They live with seven other family members, including their parents, in a specially adapted mobile home on Lynch's Lane temporary halting site in Clondalkin. The mobile was secured by Bernard O'Donnell in 2002 in settlement of earlier court proceedings brought on his behalf.
In the action before Ms Justice Laffoy, the three, through their mother, Bridget O'Donnell, claimed the council had failed to address their deteriorating circumstances and sought an order requiring the council to supply a second mobile home, specially adapted to their needs, alongside their existing one.
It was proposed Mary would live in the second home with her sisters and another female relative while Bernard and Patrick would remain in the existing mobile home with their parents.
The council denied it had failed to address the family's housing needs. It said a permanent housing site at Lynch's Lane halting site would be completed by August 2008, including a day house and a serviced bay which could accommodate three mobile homes. As only Bernard is wheelchair bound, the family did not require a second adapted mobile home, it also argued.
In her reserved judgment yesterday, Ms Justice Laffoy rejected claims that the council had breached its statutory duties under the Housing Acts and also dismissed claims of breaches of rights under the Constitution and Equal Status Act.
However, she ruled, the council had breached provisions of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights regarding the right to respect for a person's private and family life and their home. Compliance with Article 8, she found, required the council to provide another wheelchair-accessible mobile home for use by Mary so that her living conditions and those of Patrick and Bernard could be brought to an acceptable level now.
She stressed her finding was on the particular circumstances of this case which was not advanced on an assertion that the State or its organs had a positive obligation to make certain provision for every Traveller family, "such as de-luxe mobile homes".
Article 8 did not merely compel abstinence from interference with the right to respect for private and family life but might also involve inherent positive obligations, she said. In assessing whether there was such obligations, the economic wellbeing of the State was a factor to take into account.
Given that the cost of a second mobile home was some €58,000, the disability and hardships endured by the plaintiffs and the fact their mother intended to care for them with the help of other family members, it must be in the best interests of the State and its organs to facilitate her in doing so, the judge held.
She said the council had been aware from January 2005 of the family's unacceptable living conditions and had also known that the family's plight would not be alleviated until August 2008 at the earliest "if it will be then".
She was expressing that reservation because it was "not clear" the plaintiffs would have adequate facilities in August 2008, when the new Lynch's Lane facility would be ready.
The council was proposing moving the existing mobile home on to a large bay and encouraging Mr and Mrs O'Donnell to acquire another caravan for that bay, the judge said. It was offering a maximum loan for that caravan of €6,350 which, the judge ruled, was insufficient to fund a suitable mobile home for Mary.
The offer was not sufficient to ensure the rights of the three plaintiffs were "effectively and practically respected".
