Dublin City Council has asked the High Court President to set aside orders he made, making the city council responsible for accommodating the residents of Priory Hall apartment complex.
The apartments had to be evacuated last month due to serious concerns about fire safety.
Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns said the city council had put a torpedo into Priory Hall and the collateral damage was the dislocation of 250 people who lived there. He said he did not understand how the city council could say they had no responsibility for them.
An application by Dublin City Council to have the developer of the apartments, Thomas McFeely, arrested and imprisoned for breaching a court order directing him to fix the problems at Priory Hall will be heard next Thursday.
The court was told by Dublin City Council the cost of accommodating the residents to date was more than €350,000.
Dublin City Manager John Tierney is to meet the residents next week to discuss their short and long-term accommodation needs. Senior Counsel, Conleth Bradley, said the city council had also been discussing the issue with the Department of the Environment and would be meeting the department again next week.
Mr Bradley asked Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns to set aside the orders he made making the council responsible for the cost of accommodating the residents, for the cost of storing their belongings and for making up any difference in rent payable by people who were on rent supplement.
He said the city council was the fire authority in this case. He said the evacuation order the council had sought was a draconian power.
But he said the accommodation of the residents, their rent and storage costs, was a matter for the political realm, not the judicial realm. He what happened to the evacuees was not responsibility of the fire authority.
Mr Bradley said that may sound inhumane, but the city council had acted responsibly. But he said the court had no power under the fire safety legislation to order the city council to assume the responsibilities it had.
Lawyers for the residents said they were concerned the council's intention to appeal the judge's orders to the Supreme Court meant the residents were uncertain about their future accommodation, including their accommodation at Christmas.
Senior Counsel, John O'Donnell, said the residents had no assurance, written or oral, about their accommodation. He said the city council had taken this action against Thomas McFeely, knowing that he had failed to comply with undertakings to remedy problems at priory Hall on six previous occasions.
Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns said he was mystified and did not know what the city council was thinking.
If he set aside his orders, he asked, what would happen to the 250 people?
The city council said the political regime would have to take responsibility for that. The judge asked what the city council thought would happen to the people of Priory Hall. He said it beggared belief that they could wash their hands of the consequences.
The judge said he could not have made such a draconian order with such huge effects on the residents without being satisfied that they had lifeboats to take them away from the ruins. He told the city council they could appeal the orders to the Supreme Court with his blessing.
Lawyers for Thomas McFeely asked for the freezing order against his assets to be varied so that his lawyers and fire consultant could be paid. The judge granted this request.
Lawyers for the city council pointed out that Mr McFeely claimed he had no money to pay an independent contractor to fix the problems at Priory Hall but was asking the court to allow him to pay his lawyers.
The judge said these were matters he would take into account next Thursday when dealing with the application to attach and commit Mr McFeely to prison for breaching the court's order.
