The Supreme Court has cleared the way for the awarding of the State's third mobile phone licence to Meteor Communications. The five judges upheld an appeal by the Director of Telecommunications Regulation against a High Court finding that her decision to award the licence to Meteor was "objectively biased and unreasonable". The court also dismissed a cross appeal by Orange. The issue of costs will be decided next week.
Today's Supreme Court decision brings to an end lengthy and expensive litigation, initiated by the UK telecommunications giant Orange Communications, the only other bidder for the third mobile phone licence. The Director of Telecommunications Regulation, Etain Doyle, announced her decision to award the licence to Meteor in October 1998 but the issuing of the licence has been delayed pending the outcome of the action. In the High Court, Miss Justice Fidelma Macken had quashed the award of the licence to Meteor and sent the matter back to the regulator for consideration finding Ms. Doyle's decision objectively biased and unreasonable. Both the regulator and Meteor appealed to the Supreme Court.
In his judgment today, the Chief Justice said “there was not a scintilla of evidence that the regulator or any member of her staff or any of the consultants retained by her had any interest financial or otherwise in the outcome of the tender procedure and that their was no basis in law for a finding of objective bias”. And he said the claim by Orange that there was some sort of crude or xenophobic predjudice towards Orange because if was a UK company strained credulity to breaking point and was wholly unjustified.
The litigation has delayed Meteor's entry to the marketplace and spokesman Sean Finlay estimated it has cost the company up to £100 million pounds. After today's decision the telecommunications regulator, Etain Doyle, said she will now make arrangements to issue the third licence. She said the real winner today is the Irish consumer. Speaking after the decision, a spokesman for Meteor said they were delighted that they can now proceed with their plans to bring a new mobile phone service to the Irish market. They expect to be operating in the market within 9 months.
