The High Court has dismissed a judicial review challenge brought by Lodge member Alan Hines (specifically Portadown District LOIL No. 1) over the prohibition of a contentious Orange Order procession along Garvaghy Road in Portadown.
The Parades Commission had originally permitted the procession subject to conditions, but it did not take place after a large protest blocked the route and police concluded that it could not safely proceed.
The Chief Constable later asked the Secretary of State to review the determination. Police assessed that forcing the procession through would require disproportionate force, risk serious injury and widespread disorder, and place unsustainable demands on PSNI resources. The Secretary of State subsequently prohibited the procession under section 11 of the Public Processions (Northern Ireland) Act 1998.
Delivering his ruling this morning (28 October) at Belfast Hugh Court, Mr Justice Scoffield held that the decisions were lawful. Article 11 required the authorities to take reasonable measures to facilitate peaceful assembly, but it did not guarantee that a lawful procession must take place or require police to clear its route regardless of the consequences.
The court found that the authorities had made substantial efforts to facilitate the procession, including a major policing operation and negotiations aimed at resolving the dispute. The Secretary of State was entitled to consider the risks to the wider public, disruption to essential services, police resources, community relations and the prospect of serious disorder across Northern Ireland.
Although the court expressed sympathy with the Lodge’s complaint that an unlawful protest had deliberately obstructed a procession authorised by the Parades Commission, it held that the protesters’ conduct did not oblige the state to undertake a dangerous and disproportionate operation.
Leave to seek judicial review was granted on three limited grounds, but each failed on its merits. Leave was refused on the remaining grounds, and the application was dismissed in full.
The judge concluded by stressing that the law does not apply only when people agree with it and that respect for the rule of law is particularly important in a society divided by contentious issues.
“Whatever one’s standing or strength of conviction, the law does not apply only when you agree with it or with the outcome of a particular legal process. That is one thing which the court is both entitled, and in my view duty bound, to point out in the circumstances of this case. It is a lesson for those on all sides of the debate in our society, which at least for some remains (as the subject matter of this case demonstrates) deeply divided along traditional faultlines. Such divisions enhance, rather than undermine, the need for respect both for the rule of law and for the decisions of the legal mechanisms established in our democracy to resolve deep-seated disputes.”
