Appeal dismissed for State defendants; proceedings struck out except EU monies claim against Department.

Approved

No Redaction Required

THE COURT OF APPEAL

Record Numbers: 2024/192

2024/194

Neutral Citation Number [2026] IECA 27

Faherty J. Pilkington J. O’Moore J.

BETWEEN/

JOHN JOSEPH BOYLE

PLAINTIFF/

APPELLANT

- AND –

PROPERTY REGISTRATION AUTHORITY OF IREAND

REGISTRY OF DEEDS

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE FOOD AND THE MARINE

ULSTER BANK LIMITED DESIGNATED ACTIVITY COMPANY

PROMONTORIA (ULSTER) DESIGNATED ACTIVITY COMPANY

MA STEPHENS & COMPANY CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS

EDWARD BOYLE ANNE BOYLE BRIDGET DUGGAN JAMES DUGGAN

JAMES DUGGAN JUNIOR MICHAEL BOYLE NESSA BOYLE PATRICIA

MADDEN GARY MADDEN PATRICK CUNNINGHAM SHANE CUNNINGHAM

AND JOSEPH O’GORMAN

DEFENDANTS

JUDGMENT of Ms. Justice Faherty dated the 4th day of March 2026

1. This is Mr. John Joseph Boyle’s (hereafter “the plaintiff”) appeal against two Orders of the High Court (Nolan J. (“the Judge”)) dated 28 June 2024 (as perfected on 4 July 2024) the combined effect of which was that the claims brought by the plaintiff in within proceedings against the Property Registration Authority of Ireland, the Registry of Deeds and the Department of Agriculture Food and the Marine (more properly the Minister for Agriculture Food and the Marine) respectively, the first, second and third named defendants, were struck out with the plaintiff to bear the costs of those motions and the proceedings as against those defendants.

2. By a further Order dated 28 June 2024 (as perfected on 4 July 2024) the High Court struck out the plaintiff’s application for judgment in default of defence against the State defendants together with an order striking out the proceedings as against those defendants with costs to the State defendants, in respect of which the plaintiff also takes issue in this appeal (as appears from his written submissions).

3. Save where otherwise stated, I will refer to the first, second and third named defendants as “the State defendants”. Whilst the first and second defendants are now more properly “Tailte Éireann”, insofar as I may comment on them individually, I will refer to “the Property Registration Authority” and “the Registry of Deeds or the first and second defendants, for ease of reference. I will refer to the third defendant as “the Department”, again for ease of reference.

4. The State defendants are among a plethora of defendants (eighteen in all) against whom the plaintiff has instituted the within proceedings. Amongst the other defendants named in the proceedings are various members of the plaintiff's family including the executors of the estates of his deceased parents. The plaintiff’s father (the late Edward Boyle) died on 15 November 2014 and his mother (the late Winifred Boyle) on 15 August 2017.

The proceedings

5. The plenary summons issued on 22 June 2022. By the General Endorsement of Claim, the plaintiff seeks some 66 reliefs in all including a declaration that he is beneficially entitled to the entirety of lands contained in a number of identified folios all of which are situate in County Galway, and to identified Registry of Deeds lands, also situate in County Galway. Various other declarations are sought by the plaintiff including that the aforesaid lands were held by his late parents in trust for the use and benefit of the plaintiff as of the date of death of his father on 15 November 2014. He pleads that his deceased parents held the said lands in trust for his use and benefit by reason of his “direct contributions towards the building up and construction and labours upon the said lands for a period from 1992 to date on foot of the express representations made to the plaintiff by the Deceased … that he would be the owner of the said lands”.

6. It is pleaded that the plaintiff and his parents entered into a farm partnership agreement (“the Brownegrove Farm Partnership”) on or about 8 December 2009 and that the plaintiff is beneficially entitled to the assets of the said partnership. He seeks a declaration that his mother was at the time of her death in clear breach of the terms and conditions of the family partnership agreement.

7. The plaintiff seeks an order restraining the Property Registration Authority from completing an application lodged under an identified dealing number in respect of the aforementioned folio lands pending a full determination by the courts of the within proceedings, together with a declaration that the Property Registration Authority does not have the legal authority to complete the said application. He seeks an order restraining the Land Registry from completing any application concerning the change of ownership in respect of the aforementioned Registry of Deeds lands pending the full determination of the within proceedings.

8. He seeks a declaration that the Department coerced him at the age of 16 years to enter into a legally binding contract “which enabled the establishment of a herd number and milk quota on the family farm to the betterment of all Defendants which led to the abuse of the Plaintiff over a long number of years which is [akin] to modern-day slavery and financial child abuse”.

9. Additionally, he seeks an order directing the Department “to immediately pay out all monies in the form of single farm payments and all auxiliary payments as per the deed of settlement dated October 23 2018” together with an order restraining the Department “from paying out any of the monies in the form of single farm payments and all auxiliary payments to any of the Defendants pending the full determination by the Courts of the proceedings herein”.

10. The General Endorsement of Claim alleges illegal and fraudulent actions on the part of Ulster Bank Ltd DAC and Promontoria (Oyster) DAC (respectively, the fourth and fifth defendants) in relation to certain bank accounts and mortgages held in the plaintiff's name which, it is pleaded, are “null, void and unenforceable”.

11. Thereafter, the plaintiff seeks declaratory orders as against the estates of his deceased parents together with various other declaratory orders against the remaining defendants.

12. He seeks “Damages for Modern Day Slavery of the Plaintiff” against the estates of his deceased parents together with, inter alia, damages against the sixth named defendant (a firm of chartered accountants) concerning the family partnership account and all accounts containing transactions associated with the running of the family farm. Damages are also sought against many of the other defendants including the State defendants.

13. The State defendants entered an appearance on 14 September 2022.

14. On 12 September 2022, two days prior to the State defendants entering an appearance, the plaintiff delivered what he described at the appeal hearing as his first statement of claim. It reads as follows:

“Compensation for the damages and losses caused to me by the defendants over many decades of Modern Day Slavery Abuse done against me.

And for the losses suffered by the plaintiff.

And I will be relaying (sic) on the Superior Courts Rule Order 20, Section 6.

Whenever a statement of claim is delivered the Plaintiff may then Alter, Modify, or Extend his claim without any amendment of the endorsement on the summons.

I reserve the right to amend my Statement of Claim at any time.”

15. In the course of the appeal hearing, the plaintiff took issue with the State defendants having described a further statement of claim delivered on 27 February 2023 as the “first” statement of claim. The plaintiff complained that the State defendants’ written submissions were replete with factual errors, not least the assertion that the plaintiff had delivered his first statement of claim on 27 February 2023 when in fact he had delivered a statement of claim on 12 September 2022.

16. Nothing turns on this complaint, in my view. I note that the document delivered by the plaintiff on 27 February 2023 replicates the statement of claim dated 12 September 2022.

17. In any event, in response to the delivery of the 27 February 2023 statement of claim, on 10 July 2023 the Department issued a motion dated 5 July 2023 wherein it sought, inter alia, an order pursuant to Order 19, r. 28 RSC dismissing the plaintiff's action and/or in the alternative, an order striking out “the Plaintiff's purported Statement of claim on the grounds that it discloses no reasonable cause of action…” In the alternative, it sought an order dismissing and/or striking out “the Plaintiff’s purported ‘Statement of Claim' on the grounds that it offends against the most basic principles of proper pleading” on the basis that the plaintiff had failed “to identify any allegations or assertions upon which a cause of action against [the Department]) would ever be maintained”. In the further alternative, the Department sought an order pursuant to Order 19, r. 27 dismissing the plaintiff's statement of claim on grounds that it was “scandalous”. In the alternative it sought an order dismissing the action on the grounds that it was “frivolous, vexatious and bound to fail”.

18. The motion was grounded on the affidavit of Ms. Aoife Mulhern, Superintending Veterinary Inspector in the Department. Therein she avers that the statement of claim was not capable of being described as such “running as it does to some five sentences” and that there was “no particularisation whatsoever of any claim against the Third Named Defendant and no cause of action whatsoever is disclosed therein”. She avers that the purported statement of claim “lacks even a modicum of the specificity required of such a pleading”. She goes on, at para. 13, to aver:

“I say that in both Plenary Summons and the Statement of Claim, the Plaintiff maintains an entirely unspecific and unparticularised claim that the Third Named Defendant subjected the Plaintiff to or otherwise facilitated ‘Modern Day Slavery’ and seeks damages and declaratory relief to that effect. While more appropriately a matter for legal submissions, I say and believe that to baldly assert that the Plaintiff has been subjected to 'modern-day slavery' and 'financial child abuse’ by the Third Named Defendant constitutes scandalous pleading.”

19. According to Ms. Mulhern, it was “entirely unclear” what the plaintiff’s cause of action against the Department was or indeed ever could be. She avers that the plaintiff has failed to plead his case in a manner which would allow the Department to know the case that it would be required to meet at trial.

20. On 15 January 2024, the first and second defendants issued a motion in similar terms to the Department’s motion, seeking to strike out the plaintiff's proceedings against them. This motion was grounded on the affidavit of Ms. Aine Ruddy. Ms Ruddy's averments are couched in largely similar terms to those of Ms. Mulhern. She avers that the plaintiff is prosecuting his proceedings in an “omnibus fashion which only serves to obfuscate any issues which may potentially lie between the parties” (para. 12) and that “it is entirely unclear what the Plaintiff’s cause of action as against the First and Second Defendants is, or ever could be” (para. 15).

21. On 29 February 2024, the plaintiff issued his motion seeking judgment in default of defence against the State defendants.

22. It would appear to be the case that the State defendants' motions propelled the plaintiff to deliver a further six “Amended” Statements of Claim on dates between February 2024 and the hearing of the motions in June 2024. The plaintiff does not dispute that following the issuing of the State defendants’ respective motions, he delivered an Amended Statement of Claim on 22 February 2024. This was followed by two further (undated) Amended Statements of Claim following which the plaintiff delivered yet another Amended Statement of Claim on 12 April 2024. That, in turn, was succeeded by another Amended Statement of Claim delivered on 5 May 2024.

23. On 11 June 2024, the plaintiff delivered his eighth (and final) Amended Statement of Claim. There was a dispute at the appeal hearing about the circumstances in which this latter statement of claim came to be delivered. The plaintiff maintained that he obtained permission to do so from the High Court (Sanfey J.) on 7 May 2024 who, the plaintiff said, directed him to issue “a final statement of claim” to all eighteen defendants.

24. In response to the plaintiff’s assertion that the High Court granted him leave on 7 May 2024 to issue a final statement of claim, the State defendants stated that they did not appear before Sanfey J. on that date in relation to the within proceedings and so are strangers to what may or may not have happened on 7 May 2024. They submitted, however, that on the occasions they did appear before Sanfey J., they were unequivocal in their position that the plaintiff was not entitled to continually furnish fresh statements of claim without first formally obtaining the leave of the court. In any event, the State defendants say that the panoply of statements of claim furnished by the plaintiff were considered by the Judge prior to his decision to strike out the proceedings as against the State defendants.

25. I note that on the appeal the plaintiff takes issue not only with the Judge’s determination of the substantive issues before him but also with the Judge’s statement that the plaintiff had delivered seven statements of claim “none of them with the permission of the Court”. He contends that, procedurally, he was entitled pursuant to Order 28(2) RSC, to amend the statements of claim without leave in circumstances where the State defendants had not delivered a defence.

26. In short, what Order 28, r. 2 provides for is that a plaintiff may without any leave amend his statement of claim once at any time before the expiration of the time limited for a reply and before replying or, where no defence has been delivered, at any time before the expiration of four weeks from the date of the last appearance entered by a defendant.

27. Bearing in mind the provisions of Order 28, r. 2, I should say that my recognition of the final Amended Statement of Claim as incorporating the plaintiff’s pleaded case (an approach also taken by the Judge) is not to condone the actions of the plaintiff in delivering, willy nilly, copious versions of his claim. Rather, I am taking at its height the plaintiff’s assertion that he obtained liberty on 7 May 2024 to deliver a final Amended Statement of Claim. Accordingly, I look to the Amended Statement of Claim delivered on 11 June 2024 as the one which encapsulates the plaintiff’s pleaded case.

28. This Amended Statement of Claim encapsulates the contents of the third to seventh Amended Statements of Claim together and contains amendments which the plaintiff has underlined.

29. Before turning to this final Amended Statement of Claim, it will be recalled that the Department’s motion to strike out the proceedings pursuant to Order 19, r. 28 RSC issued on 10 July 2023. As it then stood, Order 19, r. 28 read as follows:

“The Court may order any pleading to be struck out, on the ground that it discloses no reasonable cause of action or answer in any such case or in case of the action or defence being shown by the pleadings to be frivolous or vexatious, the Court may order the action to be stayed or dismissed, or judgment to be entered accordingly, as the case may be just.”

30. The rule was amended with effect from 22 September 2023 by the Rules of the Superior Courts (Order 19) 2023 (S.I. No. 456/2023). The amended Order 19, r. 28 now reads: “The Court may, on an application by motion on notice, strike out any claim or part of a claim which:

(i) Discloses no reasonable cause of action, or

(ii) Amounts to an abuse of the process of the court, or

(iii) Is bound to fail, or

(iv) Has no reasonable chance of succeeding.”

31. Order 19, r. 28(3) provides, in relevant part, that the court may have regard to the pleadings and, if appropriate, to evidence in any affidavit in support of, or in opposition to, the application.

32. I note that the first and second defendants’ motion issued after the coming into force of the amended Order 19, r. 28. As already referred to, this motion, and the Department’s motion, seek essentially an order striking out the plaintiff’s statement of claim on the ground that “it discloses no reasonable cause of action”, relief which is provided for in Order 19, r.28 RSC as it stood prior to S.I. No. 456/2023 and which is also provided for in the now amended Order 19, r.28.

33. As already referred to, the unamended version of Order 19, r. 28 was designed to deal with circumstances where the case as pleaded did not disclose any cause of action and/or where a cause of action was shown to be frivolous or vexatious. When considering an application under this rule, the court was required to assume the facts as set forth in the pleadings. On the other hand, in an application to strike out brought pursuant to the court’s inherent jurisdiction, the court could, to a limited extent, consider the underlying merits of the case (see Clarke J. (as he then was) in Keohane v. Hynes [2014] IESC 66 at paras. 6.5-

6.10 for the limits of the court’s inherent jurisdiction in this regard).

34. The effect of the amendment made in September 2023 is effectively to codify the existing jurisprudence on applications to strike out, as the language in the amended Order 19, r. 28 makes clear.

35. As the pre-amendment jurisprudence shows, the court hearing an application to strike out must be confident that there is no credible basis for suggesting that it may, at trial, be possible for the plaintiff to establish the facts which are asserted in the pleadings.

36. As the case law says, the jurisdiction to strike out proceedings must be exercised “sparingly” (see Costello J. in Barry v. Buckley [1981] 1.R. 306. Moreover, as put by McCarthy J. in Sun Fat Chan v. Osseous Ltd [1992] 1 I.R. 425, “Generally the High Court should be slow to entertain an application of this kind.”. In short, as Keane J. opined in Lac Minerals v. Chevron Corporation [1995] 1 ILRM 161, “a judge in considering an application to strike out or dismiss a claim must be confident that the plaintiff’s claim cannot succeed no matter what might arise on discovery or at the trial of the action”. Hence, the court must be alert to the possibility that the claims being made by a plaintiff could be “saved” by an appropriate amendment, in line with the judgment of Birmingham J. (as he then was) in O’N v. McD [2013] IEHC 135 (see also McCarthy J. in Sun Fat Chan v. Osseous Ltd ). Here, the Judge was conscious of this requirement, as we shall see. From my reading of the judgment, I am also satisfied that the Judge was equally conscious that, in considering whether to strike out the plaintiff’s claim against the State defendants, a court “must treat the plaintiff’s claim at its high water mark” (as per Clarke J. (as he then was) in McCourt v. Tiernan [2005] IEHC 268. The issue in this appeal is whether the Judge properly applied the principles just referred to.

37. As the judgment under appeal shows, one of the determining factors for the Judge, apart from the fact the plaintiff’s claim of “modern day slavery” against the Department (of which more anon) was unsustainable in fact and in law, was that any such claim was in any event manifestly statute-barred.

38. Whilst a claim that proceedings are statute-barred may often be left to be determined at the trial of the action, it is not unknown for a defendant to seek to have this issue determined as a preliminary matter. If the issue is to be determined at an early stage, it will by reference to an agreed statement of facts or by taking the plaintiff’s case at its height. I am satisfied that in this case, the issue of the Statute of Limitations Act, 1957 (“the Statute”) was addressed by the Judge taking the plaintiff’s case at its height.

39. At the end of the day, the applications brought by the State defendants were determined by the Judge on the basis that the proceedings disclosed no reasonable cause of action against those defendants and so were bound to fail, from which, as we see, the plaintiff has appealed.

40. I turn now to the final Amended Statement of Claim. It is, I believe, not unjust to describe this pleading as an unbridled narrative of the plaintiff’s life experience (a description which also applies to the third to seventh Amended Statements of Claim). Even allowing for the fact that the plaintiff is a litigant in person, the final Amended Statement of Claim is extremely difficult to follow, replete as it is with repetitive statements and having no sense of cohesion. I concur with the Judge’s general view that the pleadings (for the most part) are “vague”, “non-specific” and “[prolix]”. I should say that for the purpose of this judgment I have concentrated on the claims the plaintiff makes against the State defendants, but where necessary and relevant reference will also be made to some of the claims the plaintiff makes against other defendants, for context.

41. Doing the best I can, I consider that the plaintiff’s pleaded case against the State defendants incorporates the following salient factors. The plaintiff pleads, essentially, that in February 1992 when he was aged 16 years, he was coerced into renting from his parents the lands comprised in an identified folio for a period of 5 years for a non-commercial consideration of £1. This grazing agreement was reached in order that the plaintiff could obtain a herd number from the Department.

42. On foot of this agreement, the plaintiff built at his own expense a slatted shed, milking parlour and dairy unit on the said lands. The slatted shed, the plaintiff says, only had capacity to house three cows in circumstances where by 2011 the plaintiff had some 300 cows. (In his orals submissions in the court below and in this Court the plaintiff maintained that the Department had to have known that the plaintiff's livestock were not being housed in his three-cow shed but rather were housed at all relevant times on the plaintiff's parents' farm, which, he asserts, was in breach of the Department’s own rules prohibiting the mixing of herds.)

43. He maintains that the need for the milk quota for which he applied once he obtained his herd number came about in circumstances where his now deceased father's milk production was above the requisite threshold in 1992. The solution, it is said, that was proposed by the plaintiff's parents and acceded to by the Department, was that the plaintiff would apply for a herd number and a milk quota which would in effect circumvent the milk quota restrictions under which his father was operating in 1992. Once the plaintiff signed the grazing agreement with his parents, he was ultimately able to obtain a herd number and a 150,000-gallon milk quota.

44. As against the Department, it is specifically pleaded:

“The Third Defendant coerced the Plaintiff at the age of 16 years to enter into a legally binding contract which enabled the establishment of a Herd number and a milk quota on the family farm to the betterment of all Defendants which led to the abuse of the Plaintiff over a long number of years which is [akin] to Modern Day Slavery and Financial Child Abuse.”

45. The plaintiff also pleads that on 1 January 1995 he rented some 30 acres of land from a named third party for 10 years. This was followed by a further leasing agreement entered into between the plaintiff and his parents on 18 December 1996 in respect of the plaintiff’s lease of a 74-acre farm across the road from the main family farm and upon which he again built at his own cost a cowshed, milking parlour and a dairy unit. All of these endeavours, the plaintiff pleads, were financed from income generated by his farming endeavours and bank loans.

46. One of the pleas advanced in the final Amended Statement of Claim is that once the plaintiff obtained his herd number, he was forced by his parents to enter into loan agreements with the Ulster Bank (a named defendant in the proceedings) which had the consequence that the plaintiff became financially bound to the family farm.

47. He pleads that he was verbally assured by his parents that in return for his labours on the farm, his parents would create a joint tenancy with the plaintiff in respect of the entire farm. He says this was told to him from the age of 14 such that he was encouraged to neglect his studies.

48. He pleads that he had the use of all the lands in a number of identified folios for the purpose, inter alia, of purchasing extra milk quota to comply with the Department’s rules on milk quota purchases.

49. He pleads that his late parents had the use and benefit of his labour and that in breach of contract failed to pay him sums due in respect of wages.

50. As against the estate of his deceased parents, the plaintiff claims that he was never paid any of the wages owed to him. That his parents were duty bound to pay him, is, he says, evident from his deceased parents’ tax returns wherein reference is made therein to their having paid the plaintiff between €90,000 and €130,000 per year, none of which however the plaintiff ever received. The plaintiff claims that the financial burden to him caused by the failure to pay him his due wages was increased by reason of the loans he was obliged to take out from Ulster Bank in his name. All of this, the plaintiff pleads, constituted economic exploitation contrary to the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (“the EU Charter”) and Article 32 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

51. Insofar as cheques were tendered to him by way of payment, he pleads that he was obliged by his late father to write cheques from his farm account in order to refund his late father in full the amount that had purportedly been paid to him in respect of his employment on the family farm.

52. He pleads that in or about I April 1993, having obtained a herd number from the Department, he had a milk quota of 3000 gallons from Mid-West Co-op Oranmore County Galway and that by 1 April 1994, he had a milk quota of 6500 gallons. He pleads as to further leased quotas in 2000-2005 which, he says, was at the behest of his late father as the latter was unable to obtain any further milk quotas in his own name. He pleads that he had as of the date of the abolition of milk quotas, “a quota in the sum of 120,000 gallons”.

53. The plaintiff pleads, essentially, that he and his late father were engaged in a scheme “so as to give the impression that [his father] was farming lands on one side of the L2216 road and the Plaintiff was farming the other”.

54. He further pleads: “The Plaintiff engaged in this practice at the insistence and under the duress of [his parents] as they forced him to neglect his studies and to work on the farm on the express representation and/or promise that one day this farm would be his. The then representatives of the Department required [the plaintiff’s father] and the plaintiff to enter a formal farm partnership agreement to comply with the applicable (EU] regulations. This was done to permit the acquisition of further milk quota as [the plaintiff’s father] was no longer able to purchase such milk quota under the then applicable regulations. That agreement provided that in return for the labour and the generation of funds derived from income from the two separate milk quotas, as [the plaintiff’s father] was unable to purchase any extra milk quota, the profits from this business were used by the Plaintiff to pay [the plaintiff’s parents’] domestic and farming bills and expenses, thus permitting [the plaintiff’s parents] to retain their profits from their farming business for [the plaintiff’s parents]…joint pension fund. This fund as of the death of [the plaintiff’s father] was in the order of 1,300, 000 approximately.”

55. By way of reliefs claimed against the Department, the plaintiff seeks an order that the Department “coerced the Plaintiff at the age of sixteen years to enter into a legally binding contract which enabled the establishment of a herd number and milk quota on the family farm to the betterment of all defendants… which is akin to “Modern day Slavery and Financial Child Abuse. The [Department] was engaged in coercive control of the Plaintiff for a long number of years…The [Department] acted illegally by making the Plaintiff sign a legally binding contract when the Plaintiff was a child without independent legal representation to protect the legal interest of the Plaintiff.” He also seeks a declaration to like effect. As I have already adverted to, damages are also sought against the Department.

56. The final Amended Statement of Claim also pleads that the seventh defendant registered with the Department’s “Agfood” website “to gain access to the Plaintiff’s Herd details and downloaded a vast amount of [the plaintiff’s] personal data which is a data breach from 2010 to 2015 which happened on the 14/01.15. Under the guise of [the plaintiff’s] late Father…With the collusion of the Third Defendant. Which is a breach of the Data Protection Act 1988-2018…the plaintiff is seeking damages from the Third and Seventh Defendants for the breach of Data Protection EU Regulations which is a serious matter.” Elsewhere it is pleaded that “the Third Defendant was giving [the plaintiff’s] personal data to persons that had absolutely nothing to do with the livestock solely owned by the Plaintiff…”.

57. There are further pleas in the final Amended Statement of Claim to the effect that the Department is “[a]ctively retaining monies owed to the Plaintiff” and that the plaintiff is seeking damages for the loss suffered as a result. I will address this aspect of the plaintiff’s claim against the Department in more detail later in the judgment.

58. As against the Land Registry, the plaintiff pleads that on 8 December 2009 “the Second Defendant transferred to the [plaintiff’s] sole name and only owner the lands bearing [an identified number] by (sic) the [plaintiff’s] Parents”. It is pleaded that on 23 June 2010 “a Form 1 Registry of Deeds was Lodged with the Second Defendant where lands were transferred into the [plaintiff’s] sole name as can be seen in the Section Grantee CODE 68249. This transaction was carried out by [a named firm of solicitors]”.

59. It is also pleaded that on 23 June 2010, a Form 3 (Registry of Deeds) was lodged with the Land Registry (by way of application for the registration of a mortgage/charge/debenture) “where the Lands in the Sole name of the Plaintiff” were then granted to Ulster Bank (the fourth named defendant) “in the names of [the plaintiff’s parents and the plaintiff[ even though the property was clearly in [the plaintiff’s] Sole Name CODE 68250”. It is said that this was “an illegal burden” placed on the plaintiff’s sole lands and that it was a transaction carried out by a named firm of solicitors who were not the plaintiff’s solicitors. It is also said that the plaintiff’s name is not listed on the second page of the document although there is reference thereon to “John”. It is pleaded that the Registry of Deeds “colluded with others to defraud the Plaintiff of the lands these actions are illegal”.

60. As part of the reliefs claimed in the final Amended Statement of Claim, the plaintiff seeks:

“[a]n Order that the First and Second Defendant have colluded with other parties to try and defraud the Plaintiff of the Lands that were transferred to the Plaintiff by the Deed of transfer signed by [the plaintiff’s] late mother.”

and

“[a]n Order restraining the Registry of Deeds from completing any application concerning the change of ownership of all the lands contained in Registry of Deeds lands bearing [an identified reference number]…pending full determination by the courts of the proceedings herein”

it being asserted that the Registry of Deeds is “in Joint Enterprise with other Defendants against the Plaintiff.”

61. Damages in the sum of €1,500,000 are sought against the Registry of Deeds “for the attempted transfer of the lands to other persons and away from the Plaintiff”.

62. There is very little by way of pleading in the final Amended Statement of Claim as regards the Property Registration Authority (the first defendant). Relief is however sought against this defendant, as can be seen above, by way of an order that the Property Registration Authority has colluded with others to try and defraud the plaintiff of his lands. The plaintiff also seeks damages to the tune of €950,000 against the Property Registration Authority “for the attempted transfer of the lands transferred to the Plaintiff by deed”.

63. In answer to a question from the Court at the appeal hearing, the plaintiff contended that the first and second defendants had allowed people to place a burden on lands in the plaintiff’s name without his knowledge or consent. In that way, the plaintiff contends, the first and second defendants aided and abetted his life of “slavery”.

64. In the final Amended Statement of Claim the plaintiff also advances the plea that his parents/mother breached the farm partnership agreement by refusing to pay him 98% of the farm profits during the years of the agreement. There is reference to Circuit Court proceedings instituted by the plaintiff against his late mother.

65. There is also reference to various High Court proceedings, including proceedings bearing record number 2016/8432P instituted by the executors (the seventh and ninth defendants in the within proceedings) of the plaintiff’s late mother’s estate, and to “Terms of Settlement” agreed by the parties in October 2018 in respect of those proceedings. It is pleaded that the Terms of Settlement are null and void by the reason of alleged “continued breaching” by the seventh and ninth defendants of the said terms.

66. Myriad pleas are also made in the final Amended Statement of Claim in respect of the other named defendants.

67. It will be recalled that the State defendants’ respective motions issued on foot of the Statement of Claim delivered on 27 February 2023. By the time of the hearing of the motions, the plaintiff had delivered a further six iterations of his statement of claim, culminating in the final Amended Statement of Claim delivered on 11 June 2024. As their written submissions in the court below demonstrate, notwithstanding that the plaintiff had “prolifically furnished the State Defendants with various documents each purporting to be a fresh Statement of Claim”, the position of the State defendants was that “no legitimate cause of action against the State Defendants exists” and that the essence of the plaintiff’s case related to “a grievance which the Plaintiff has in respect of certain familial matters involving the operation and distribution of his late father’s farm, which matters have absolutely nothing to do with the State Defendants”.

68. It was also the State Defendants’ position (as again clear from their written submissions in the court below) that having exhausted the liberty afforded him by Order 28, r. 2 RSC to amend his statement of claim “once at any time before the expiration of the time limited for reply”, “all subsequent purported Statements of Claim which have been submitted are not in compliance with the Rules of the Superior Courts”. As we shall see, however, notwithstanding the position adopted by the State defendants, the Judge did in fact have regard to the various statements of claim when considering the strike out applications.

The High Court judgment

69. The State defendants' motions and the plaintiff's motion for judgment in default of defence came on for hearing on 25 June 2024.

70. At the outset of his ex tempore judgment, the Judge outlined in broad terms the nature of the plaintiff’s pleaded claims as against various defendants and he noted the reference in the pleadings to a settlement the plaintiff entered into with his siblings in October 2018.

71. With regard to “the eight, seven or so” statements of claim delivered by the plaintiff, he remarked: “the content of them is much the same”. Turning “a blind eye” to the plethora of statements of claim before him which, he said, “would normally be an abuse of process”, the Judge considered that the essence of the plaintiff's case as it appeared from his pleadings was that "he was taken advantage of… by his parents". He noted the claim that once the plaintiff had signed the grazing agreement he was told by his parents and an unnamed member of the Department that he was “now locked in and could not get out of his obligations” and that as time went on, he was told by staff members of the Department that he had a duty and obligation to pay for the pension of his parents.

72. He reprised the plaintiff's oral submissions in the following terms:

"The plaintiff spoke very eloquently about the difficulties he had with his parents. As I've said earlier, it seems to me that at the age of 16 he was asked to sign a grazing agreement in order to get a herd number. He was a minor or under a disability at that time… From thereon it would seem… that the plaintiff's parents were seeking to extend the herd size by using their 16-year-old son as a vehicle. This the Plaintiff described as modern-day slavery and in colloquial terms he might be right.

In reality the Plaintiff did not have his own farm and he says the Department were aware of this. He relies upon assertions made by unknown members of the Department who he says [were] fully aware of what was going on. He also says that other members of the Department over the years were fully aware of what was going on, pointing to a small shed he had, as if that was his farm when that clearly could not be the case. However, that case is not made out in any detail that I can ascertain in any of the seven versions of the statement of claim. The plaintiff says that all the debts and problems that he has got into and the money that was borrowed from Ulster Bank and all the other liabilities he now incurred stems from that time when he was 16. Sadly it would seem that he was cut out of the family will because the family, and more particularly his mother, wasn't happy with his marriage. It seems to me that the plaintiff is lucky to have the benefit of his wife who is a great support to him”

73. The Judge noted that the plaintiff was seeking damages in excess of €8.42m on the basis of what he claimed was consequential loss sustained from the year 2012 at approximately €700,000 per year.

74. The Judge observed that the plaintiff “seems to accept that he doesn’t have a case against the first named defendant [the Property Registration Authority] but against the second named defendant [the Land Registry] he has calculated his valuations”. He commented that the plaintiff’s case against the first and second defendants was “based on the property he may lose if his brothers and sisters are successful in registering their names as legal owners”.

75. Whilst observing that the plaintiff appeared to have been treated in an unfair way, the Judge, however, could not decide the matter on that basis since he was “simply dealing with the motion brought by the State defendants as to whether there’s a case against them”.

76. Turning to the law, he noted that the State defendants were relying upon Order 19, r.

28 RSC which allows the court to strike out any proceedings on the grounds that they do not disclose a reasonable cause of action and/or where the pleadings may be described as frivolous and vexatious. He noted the State defendants' contention that "there is no reasonable cause of action against the State defendants” in the statement of claim and that it was “vague and non-specific and [prolix] and practically incomprehensible". The Judge noted that under an application under Order 19, r. 28, the court could only deal with the application “based upon the pleadings before it'”. He accepted that striking out the proceedings had the potential, if not justified, of causing an injustice to the plaintiff.

77. Citing the decision of Birmingham J. in O’N v. McD, the Judge was cognisant that there was a duty on the court to ascertain whether an amendment to the pleadings “may potentially alter the position”. However, “sadly”, it seemed to the Judge that the proceedings as against the State defendants were “doomed” and that there was nothing to be done to save them.

78. He noted that the plaintiff had delivered seven different versions of the statement of claim. He opined that a party was only entitled to amend pleadings once without the permission of the court and that a party was “not entitled to continually change the case or add little bits to it as they see fit”.

79. In the view of the Judge, “the one thing that is abundantly clear is that the plaintiff does not have a cause of action against the State defendants”. In his view, the pleadings, such as they are, “do not make a coherent case or even any case against them”. Whilst the plaintiff had sought to link the Department to the activities of his parents and his siblings, it seemed to the Judge, even if the plaintiff were able to prove the points he makes, that the reality was that his case “will be statute barred by decades”. In the Judge’s view, “there is nothing that can be done by way of an amendment which can save the case as against the State defendants”. The plaintiff's calculation of alleged damages was “not based upon any legal principle”. He considered that “as a matter of law, the awarding the plaintiff a herd number at the age of 16 cannot give rise to a claim in damages”. The Judge went on to state:

“His claim was that he was subjected to some form of modern-day slavery. That is not sustainable on the facts or the law as against the State defendants.”

80. Insofar as the plaintiff was concerned that if the State defendants were let out of the proceedings, he would not get the key documents to support his case, that was not, in the Judge’s view, a basis upon which to keep such defendants in the proceedings when there is no case against them.

81. The Judge’s conclusion was in the following terms:

“It seems to me that the defendants-State defendants are entitled to the order pursuant to Order 19, rule 28 on the basis that the proceedings, as presently before the Court, disclose no reasonable cause of action. And on that basis, the case is bound to fail”.

82. As I intimated earlier, the Judge afforded the plaintiff significant latitude to address the court on the issues raised in his various statements of claim and further afforded him every opportunity to articulate the basis of his claim as against the State defendants. As he put it, for the purposes of the applications before him, the Judge was prepared “to turn a blind eye to what would normally be an abuse of process”.

The Appeal

83. By his notice of appeal, the plaintiff asserts that the Judge erred in law and/or fact:

(1) In deciding that the plaintiff was not protected by the Irish Constitution.

(2) In deciding that the plaintiff was not protected by the European Agency for Fundamental Rights.

(3) In deciding that the plaintiff was not protected by the United Nations Charter of Human Rights.

(4) In deciding that the State defendants’ motions were to be granted.

(5) In deciding that the removal of the State defendants from the plaintiff's case would not have a detrimental effect on his case.

(6) By denying the plaintiff his rights under the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution Act, 1972.

(7) By denying the plaintiff his rights under the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights to the protection under the age of majority.

(8) In denying the plaintiff his rights under Article 4 of European Convention of Human Rights.

The State defendants oppose the appeal in its entirety.

Discussion and Decision

84. Bearing in mind the relevant jurisprudence pertaining to applications to strike out to which I have referred above, I address below the argument canvassed by the plaintiff on the appeal. I turn firstly to his argument regarding the Judge’s treatment of the claims he has advanced against the Department.

85. Fundamentally, the plaintiff’s case is that the agreement he entered into with his parents in 1992, and the contract he signed with the Department by which he obtained a herd number, breached his rights under national, EU and international law. He relies on the provision in the Irish Constitution which stipulates that the age of majority in the State is 18 years, and he emphasises the fact that when he entered into the respective agreements with his parents and the Department in 1992, he was aged just 16. Relying on Roche v. Peilow [1985] I.R. 232, he contends that contracts entered into by minors are voidable unless they involve necessaries or are otherwise to the minor’s benefit, neither of which, he says, obtained in his case. He points to the decision of the English Courts in Nash v. Inman [1908]

2 KB1 as persuasive authority in this regard also. He submits that if the decision of the High Court is upheld, then what will amount to a variation by this Court of the Age of Majority Act 1985, which, he says, is something the court cannot do since any such variation is solely the preserve of the legislature.

86. Reliance is placed on the EU Charter, in particular, Articles 14, 21, 24 and 32. He cites also the United Nations Charter and the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Articles 1 and 4), the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the United Nations Convention on Civil and Political Rights. The plaintiff submits that many of international and EU legal instruments he invokes in aid of his submissions will be required to be revised if the Judge’s ruling is allowed to stand.

87. The plaintiff points to Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights which prohibits slavery and “forced or compulsory labour”, and to the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (the plaintiff in this regard referencing Siliadin v. France [2005] (App No. 733161/01); Rantsev v. Cyprus and Russia [2010] (App No. 25965/04) 51 EHRR, Chowdury & Others v. Greece [2017] (App No. 21884/15) and C.N. v. United Kingdom [2012] (App No. 4239/08)).

88. Whilst the plaintiff in his written submissions also cited English case law, said by him to espouse the principles upon which his case against the State defendants should be allowed to go to trial (some of which case law, I might add, could not be found), I am satisfied that there is ample guidance provided by the jurisprudence of the Irish courts as to when it is appropriate to strike out proceedings on the basis that they disclose no reasonable cause of action or are otherwise bound to fail. I have referred to some of this case law earlier in this judgment.

89. In reliance on the international and domestic instruments and English case law referred to above, the plaintiff takes issue with the Judge’s finding that there were “no identifiable allegations against the State”, arguing that he was just 16 years of age when he signed a contract with the Department, which, he alleges, led to the “modern day slavery” of which he complains. The agreement entered into with his parents is described by the plaintiff as, in essence, slavery or servitude which, he contends, is contrary to both domestic and international legal protections.

90. He asserts that proof of his allegation of modern-day slavery against the Department is found in the contract he signed with the Department in 1992. He points to the Judge having referred to the fact that he was coerced into signing a binding agreement with the Department to establish a herd number and a milk quota “for the betterment of others”. Contrary to the plaintiff’s suggestion, however, by saying what he said in the judgment, the Judge was not make any finding in favour of the plaintiff: all the Judge was doing was simply reprising the case advanced by the plaintiff.

91. The plaintiff contends that the Judge erred striking out his claim of “modern-day slavery” against the Department in circumstances where the plaintiff only came to realise in the summer of 2022 via a CNN news broadcast that what had happened to him aged 16 amounted to “modern-day slavery”. He asserts that the Judge was wrong to say that he was not entitled to damages against the Department in circumstances where he was coerced as a 16-year-old minor to sign a contract without legal advice all of which breached his legal rights under domestic, EU and international law. He reiterates that he was forced by his parents, with the aid of the Department, to hand over to his parents the milk quota payments which he received from the Department consequent on his having was obtained a herd number and an allocated milk quota. He contends that the servitude to which he was subject extended to his having to give financial assistance to his parents and a disabled sibling in addition to having to pay for the third level education of two other siblings.

92. The first observation I would make about the plaintiff's pleaded claim of “modern day slavery” against the Department is that it is opaque in the extreme. It is not in dispute that the plaintiff was granted a herd number by the Department at a time when he was 16 years of age. Beyond pleading that as a fact and citing that fact as the basis of the liability he asserts the Department bears for his predicament of “modern day slavery”, the plaintiff has not in his pleadings adverted to any other factual basis for the claim he makes against the Department. Rather, in his various statements of claim he has described at great length a prolonged intra-familial dispute involving himself, his late parents and his siblings, ultimately related to what I understand to be the plaintiff’s disinheritance of the family farm. All in all, as the Judge observed, the plaintiff’s various grievances appear to have their genesis in certain actions undertaken by his late father in an attempt to increase his milk quota entitlements and in matters that transpired after the deaths of his parents. As this judgment is concerned only with the plaintiff’s appeal against the applications brought by the State defendants, other than to make the observation I have just made, I do not propose to comment further on the various claims the plaintiff advances against the remaining 15 defendants in the action, including the executors of his late mother’s estate.

93. As regards the plaintiff’s principal claim against the Department, namely that the granting of a herd number to the plaintiff in 1992 constituted the slavery or servitude of the plaintiff at the hands of the Department, I hold that that contention is unsustainable in law and in fact. Without commenting on the Department’s submission there was nothing inherently illegal in the plaintiff having been granted a herd number in 1992 even if he was a minor at the time, the plaintiff has not put any factual basis before the Court to ground his claim of slavery or servitude at the hands of the Department. Taking, as I must, his pleaded case and his affidavit evidence at its height, I am of the view that all that occurred in 1992 was that the Department granted the plaintiff an entitlement to hold cattle and produce milk. By any stretch of logic or reason, that does not translate into an allegation of the plaintiff having been subjected to “modern day slavery” at the hands of the Department. Save the bare assertions referred to above, the plaintiff has not pointed to any action or omission on the part of the Department that could conceivably give rise to the “modern day slavery” of the plaintiff. Specifically, he has not pointed to any factor which suggested knowledge on the part of the Department that he was not being paid for his work on the family farm. This is despite the fact, as the High Court judgment shows, that the plaintiff was given great latitude and afforded ample opportunity in the court below to do so.

94. As the State defendants point out, the plaintiff was permitted not only to refer to his various statements of claim but also to address the High Court at great length on the narrative history of his interaction with the Department and its representatives. In effect, the plaintiff was afforded the opportunity to introduce a body of viva voce evidence which was never previously set out on affidavit or otherwise. This notwithstanding, the plaintiff was unable to articulate any cause of action against the Department other than the bald assertion that the granting of herd number had the effect of subjecting him to “modern-day slavery”. In those circumstances (even assuming for present purposes that the various international instruments upon which he relies conferred on him rights capable of enforcement before the Irish courts (and they do not)), the plaintiff’s reliance on the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the United Nations Convention on Civil and Political Rights cannot assist him, in the absence of any credible or stateable basis for the plaintiff’s “modern day slavery” claim against the Department. The same applies to his reliance on the EU Charter. Nor can he place any meaningful reliance on Article 4 of the European Convention of Human Rights in the absence of his being able to articulate how, as a matter of law or fact, the granting of a herd number to him by the Department represented a breach of his rights under Article 4.

95. Insofar as the plaintiff referred to the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution Act 1972, and by implication, to Article 16 of the Constitution, Article 16 is concerned with the age of suffrage, and is of no relevance to the plaintiff's claim. Similarly, his reliance on the European Agency for Fundamental Rights cannot assist him. That EU organisation is concerned solely with policy development and advocacy and so does not confer any legal right capable of enforcement before the Irish courts.

96. More fundamentally, even taking at its height the plaintiff’s case that the granting to him of a herd number and a milk quota constituted a case of slavery capable of being made out in tort or in contract, any such claim on that basis crystallised on the attainment by the plaintiff of his majority in the mid-1990s such that he is now manifestly statutebarred. Insofar he maintains that he only became aware in 2022 that his circumstances constituted slavery, that cannot assist him in circumstances where there is no suggestion of his having been unaware until 2022 that he had obtained a herd number and a milk quota, or of all of the things he now alleges were done to him.

97. Accordingly, the Judge was also entirely correct in holding that even if a reasonable cause of action was disclosed as against the Department on grounds of “modern day slavery” (and he found correctly that it was not), such a claim would be manifestly statute-barred. To repeat, on the plaintiff's own case, he was granted a herd number in or about 1992 at a time when he was aged 16. He was at all material times aware of the fact that he had been granted such a herd number. Hence, even if that fact of itself constituted a cause of action (and it does not), the plaintiff’s cause of action would have crystallised at some point upon his attaining the age of majority in the mid-1990s. As against this, the within proceedings were commenced in 2022, decades after any cause of action as against the Department on the basis of “modern day slavery” would have crystallised.

98. I note the plaintiff attempts to address this issue by claiming that he only became aware that he was a victim of “modern day slavery” while watching a CNN television report in June of 2022. This indeed may be the case but insofar as he relies on June 2022 as the operative date for the purposes of the running of the Statute, this is misconceived as a matter of law. At the risk of repetition, he was at all relevant times aware of the fact that he was granted a herd number in or about 1992 (i.e. the factual scenario which grounds his assertion of “modern day slavery” against the Department). Hence, for the purposes of any action which the plaintiff believes he has against the Department, time began to run upon the attainment by the plaintiff of his majority in the mid-1990s. Unfortunately for the plaintiff, his state of knowledge with respect to any legal remedy which may or may not exist relative to his claims is immaterial.

99. I turn now to the other pleas advanced against the Department in the final Amended Statement of Claim.

100. I have earlier set out the plea advanced in the final Amended Statement of Claim that the Department has breached the plaintiff’s data protection rights. In his affidavit sworn 20 June 2024, he avers, at para. 6, that a named defendant sibling in the proceedings created an online account with the Department's website, “Agfood.ie”, as result of which, the plaintiff alleges, the Department allowed the plaintiff's personal data to be furnished to that sibling in breach of the plaintiff's data protection rights.

101. This plea was not specifically addressed by the Judge. That the Judge did not specifically advert to this alleged breach is hardly surprising given the dearth of pleading in the final amended Statement of Claim as to what exactly the Department did such that it is said to have breached the plaintiff’s rights under the relevant data protection legislation. In my view, even if the Judge had adverted to it, he could scarcely have considered, without more, the plea advanced in the final Amended Statement of Claim as disclosing a cause of action against the Department. At its height, the substance of the plea speaks to alleged actions on the part of the seventh defendant (a sibling of the plaintiff and one of the executors of his late mother’s estate), and not to any coherently pleaded action or omission on the part of the Department.

102. The other plea advanced, both in the General Endorsement of Claim to the Plenary summons and in final Amended Statement of Claim, against the Department is that the Department has retained monies to which the plaintiff claims he is entitled pursuant to the terms of a letter written by the Department on 24 January 2019 wherein the Department informed the plaintiff that his application for EU payments had been successful.

103. The letter headed “Re: 2016 Transfer Entitlements” reads as follows:

“Dear Applicant,

I refer to the above application to transfer entitlements under the 2016 Scheme year. I am pleased to inform you that your application has been successful.”

104. The “Entitlements Transferred” are described in the letter as follows:

“Transferor [ ]”; “Transferee [ ]”; “Transfer Type” “Inheritance”; “Entitlement Type” “BPS”; “Transferred Ents” “74.10”; “Unit Value” “222.52”; and “Total Value” “16488.73”. The “Effective Date” is given as “16/05/16”. “Lease End Date” is left blank.

105. The letter goes on to state:

“If for any reason the value of the individual entitlements is amended after the date of this letter, the revised value will apply to this transaction. EU regulations provide that any payment entitlements unduly allocated to a farmer may be recovered and allocated to the National Reserve. Where allocation of such payment entitlements have been transferred to another farmer the transferee must relinquish the unduly allocated entitlements to the National Reserve”.

106. In the Final Amended Statement of Claim, the plaintiff pleads as follows as regards those payments:

“The plaintiff has a letter from the Third Defendant dated 24/01/19 where the Third Defendant informs the Plaintiff that…application to transfer entitlements under the 2016 scheme year. I am pleased to inform you that your application has been successful’ [w]hich demonstrates that the entitlements are the property of the Plaintiff…[and] that the Third Defendant is Actively retaining the monies owed to the Plaintiff. The Plaintiff is seeking damages for this loss suffered.”

107. Earlier in the final Amended Statement of Claim, he pleads:

“…the Third Defendant has not made payments to the Plaintiff of the European Payments owed to him which has caused the Plaintiff Damages over a long number of years which is [akin] to Modern day Slavery and Financial Abuse”.

108. In the reliefs claimed, the plaintiff seeks, inter alia:

“37. An Order that the Third Defendant has colluded with other parties to defraud the Plaintiff of all Farm Payments due to the Plaintiff from the European Union”

and

“46 An Order directing the Third named Defendant to immediately pay out all the monies in the form of single farm payments and all auxiliary payments due to the Plaintiff. Which has caused the Plaintiff serious financial damages for many years till now.”

109. In his appeal submissions, the plaintiff pointed to the Department’s unlawful retention of “Transfer Entitlements” which he says are properly payable to him pursuant to the Department’s own letter of 24 January 2019.

110. As far as I can ascertain, the Judge did not specifically advert to the aforesaid pleadings. Again, this is scarcely surprising given the unwieldy and scattergun approach the plaintiff has adopted in his pleadings. There is, however, a reference at p. 3 of the transcript of the High Court judgment to the plaintiff having on foot of the terms of Settlement of 23 October 2018 been paid “the sum of 50,000 [by other defendants] and was to be paid more monies, being monies coming from the third named defendant [the Department], but that hasn’t happened”. The Judge goes on to say that that “is only clear from his oral submissions and not from anything I could glean from the statements of claim”.

111. In my view and taking the plaintiff’s pleadings at their height, the plea that the Department is unlawfully retaining monies due to the plaintiff cannot be summarily dismissed as not disclosing a reasonable cause of action. Whatever its merits (and that is for another day), the plea is being advanced in the context of a communication to the plaintiff from the Department on 24 January 2019 to the effect that he is entitled to certain EU payments payable (presumably) via the Department. The plaintiff pleads that these payments are being withheld from him by the Department. On its face, therefore, it cannot be said that the pleading does not disclose a reasonable cause of action. Furthermore, the claim cannot, on its face, be said to be statute-barred, emanating as it does from a communication in January 2019 in circumstances where the plaintiff appears to assert an entitlement to ongoing payments, and where the within proceedings were commenced in June 2022.

112. For the reasons just set out, I am satisfied that the plaintiff’s pleading that the Department is withholding monies said by the plaintiff to be properly payable to him should stand. For that reason, the Department is required to remain a defendant in the within proceedings to answer the plaintiff’s claim that it is unlawfully withholding monies from him.

113. I turn now to the plaintiff’s appeal submissions against the striking out of his proceedings against the first and second defendants.

114. As against the second defendant (the Registry of Deeds), the plaintiff claims, with regard to lands that were granted to him in his sole name by his parents, that the Registry of Deeds wrongly permitted Ulster Bank to have a charge registered in its favour on these lands on 23 June 2010, with the plaintiff's parents named (in addition to the plaintiff) as the grantor of the charge when, the plaintiff contends, the grantor should only have been the plaintiff. He points to a Registry of Deeds “Form 3” bearing the date 23 June 2010 which, he says, is entirely unclear as to its meaning or effect given that under the heading “Description of the Property”, there is reference to “John” alongside the names of his parents. This, the plaintiff says, begs the question as to who is being referred to by the appellation “John”. That argument apart, the plaintiff's fundamental complaint as regards the first and second defendants is they engaged in fraud and collusion against the plaintiff “for the betterment of others”.

115. The first thing to be observed is that insofar as the plaintiff, in his oral submissions, relied on the contents of the various indentures referred above as constituting his cause of action against the first and/or second defendants, none of this was in fact set out in the plaintiff’s pleadings. The claim that the Registry of Deed document, Form 1 should not have included his parents was not pleaded by the plaintiff in any of the statements of claim delivered by him. Indeed, in none of those statements of claim is any cause of action set out against the first and second defendants in any meaningful way save a bald assertion of “collusion” or “fraud”.

116. In my view, the nature of claims the plaintiff advances against the Property Registration Authority and the Registry of Deeds remains entirely unclear apart from the non-specific and unparticularised allegations of fraud and conspiracy which the plaintiff has alluded to. When fraud is alleged, it is necessary to plead same with precision.

117. As required by Order 19, r. 5(2) RSC:

“In all cases alleging misrepresentation, fraud, breach of trust, wilful default or undue influence and in all other cases in which particulars may necessary, particulars (with dates and items if necessary) shall be set out in the pleadings.”

Hence, a party alleging fraud must specify in “sufficient” terms “the nature of the fraud contended together with specifying the alleged consequences thereof… and [establish] a prima facie case to that effect” (as per Clarke J. (as he then was) in National Educational Welfare Board v. Neil Ryan, I.T. Upgrade Ltd and Peter O’Grady [ 2007] IEHC 428). In Keaney v. Sulivan and Others [2015] IESC 75, Dunne J., writing for the Supreme Court, stated that it was “necessary to set out the allegations of fact in a statement of claim or pleading on which the plea concerned rests”. She went on to state:

“One does not lightly make an allegation of fraud against another party…The fact that absolute privilege attaches to pleadings in legal proceedings is not a licence to make unsubstantiated allegations of a serious nature such as fraud against another party. Care must be taken before making such an allegation. There must be available facts to support such a plea, and those facts must be particularised in the pleading concerned. The seriousness of such a plea is underlined by the express requirement contained in Order 19, rule 5 of the RSC to properly particularise such allegations.”

118. More recently, in Keane v. Ulster Bank DAC [2024] IECA 293, this Court stated, at para. 49:

“…while on an application of this nature the plaintiffs’ case must be taken at its high water mark, it does not follow that any assertion made by a plaintiff must be accepted at face value, where there is no evidence to support it or no credible basis for believing that there could be any evidence.”

119. I also note that the claims of fraud and collusion (vague and non-specific as they are) did not appear in the first or second statements of claim but rather only in subsequent statements of claim (including the final Amended Statement of Claim).

120. To my mind, at no point in any of the statements of claim he has delivered, has the plaintiff identified a cogent or coherent cause of action against either the Property Registration Authority or the Registry of Deeds beyond the most vague and non-specific allegations of “collusion” and “fraud”. Even in his legal submissions to this Court the plaintiff did not articulate any specific cause of action against the first and second defendants such as might have warranted consideration by this Court of whether an amendment to the final Amended Statement of Claim could stave off the relief sought by the first and second defendants.

121. For the reasons set out above, I would uphold the decision and Order of the Judge striking out the proceedings as against the first and second defendants.

The plaintiff’s appeal against the High Court Order striking out his motion seeking judgment in default of defence against the State defendants

122. Whilst the plaintiff’s grounds of appeal do not allude to any error on the part of the Judge in having struck out his motion seeking judgment against the State defendants in default of defence, nevertheless, the two notices of appeal the plaintiff has filed seek “An Order setting aside all Orders from…28 June 2024” (my emphasis). In his written submissions, he cites Order 21 RSC which sets out the timelines for the delivery of a defence which he says the State defendants breached.

123. Insofar as the plaintiff, in the within appeal, takes issue with his motion having been struck out, and asserts that the State defendants should have filed a timely defence to the statement of claim the plaintiff delivered on 12 September 2022, I offer the following observations. Notably, no action was taken by the plaintiff between September 2022 and February 2024 in response to the State defendants’ tardiness in filing their defence. It was only when the State defendants, on 5 July 2023 and 15 January 2024 respectively, filed their motions seeking to have the plaintiff’s proceedings against them struck out that the plaintiff was galvanised into action in seeking judgment against the State defendants in default of defence.

124. Leaving aside altogether the fact that the plaintiff’s motion appears to have been triggered by the State defendants’ strike out motions, fundamentally, as far as the first and second defendants are concerned, the plaintiff has no basis upon which to cavil with the High Court Order striking out his motion for judgment in circumstances where this Court has upheld the Order of the High Court striking out the plaintiff’s proceedings as against the Property Registration Authority and the Land Registry, all of which renders the plaintiff’s motion seeking judgment against the first and second defendants entirely moot.

125. It is the case that the Department remains a defendant in the proceedings, to the extent set out earlier in this judgment. That, however, to my mind, is not sufficient for this Court to make any different order to that made by the High Court in respect of the plaintiff’s motion in circumstances where, if there had been no motions seeking the striking out of the plaintiff’s proceedings and only the plaintiff’s motion for judgment in default of defence before the High Court, it is highly improbable that such a motion would have been successful given that the primary objective of the procedure provided for in the rules is to ensure that a defence is filed. Hence, as far as the Department is concerned, it is, at this juncture, sufficient for this Court to say that it now behoves the Department to deliver its defence to such case against it as remains standing in the proceedings, namely the plaintiff’s plea that the Department has unlawfully retained EU monies properly payable to the plaintiff.

Summary

126. For the reasons set out above, I would uphold the decision and Order of the High Court striking out the within proceedings as against the first and second named defendants. Insofar as the third named defendant (the Department) is concerned, I would vary the Order of the High Court such that it should reflect that in the within proceedings all pleadings are struck out as against the third named defendant save that portion of the pleadings that relates to the plaintiff’s claim that the third named defendant is wrongfully withholding EU monies said by the plaintiff to be due and owing to him by the third named defendant.

Costs

127. The Court will hear from the parties on a date to be advised as to what order it should make in relation to the costs orders made by the High Court and the costs orders that should be made on the appeal.

128. As this judgment is being delivered electronically, Pilkington J. and O’Moore J. have indicated their agreement therewith and the orders I have proposed.