{"id":669161,"date":"2026-09-02T18:03:44","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T18:03:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/669161\/"},"modified":"2026-09-02T18:03:44","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T18:03:44","slug":"criticism-of-gordon-lyons-over-irish-language-strategy-unwarranted-high-court-judge-says-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/669161\/","title":{"rendered":"Criticism of Gordon Lyons over Irish language strategy \u2018unwarranted\u2019, High Court judge says \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Findings of illegality made against Stormont<\/a> Communities Minister Gordon Lyons in a High Court battle to obtain an Irish language strategy were unwarranted, a judge has ruled.<\/p>\n

Mr Justice McAlinden held that further information on steps taken by Mr Lyons meant a previous determination that he failed to respond to his own department is to be rescinded.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny such criticism of the Minister<\/a> was unwarranted,\u201d the judge stated.<\/p>\n

He confirmed, however, that the Executive remains in collective breach of a clear legal obligation to implement an Irish language strategy.<\/p>\n

\"Garvaghy<\/a>\"Loyalist<\/a><\/p>\n

The final outcome was reached in campaign group Conradh na Gaeilge\u2019s latest challenge to the ongoing delay in adopting a blueprint.<\/p>\n

Two courts have previously declared Stormont is in breach of a legal duty to ensure an initiative which dates back to the 2006 St Andrews Agreement.<\/p>\n

Based on the continued alleged violation, Conradh na Gaeilge brought further judicial review proceedings against both the Executive and the Department for Communities (DfC).<\/p>\n

The language campaigner claimed an unjustified failure to act, and that Mr Lyons has unlawfully \u201cthwarted\u201d any implementation.<\/p>\n

It was confirmed in court that a strategy will not be in place before the current Assembly\u2019s regime ends in May 2027.<\/p>\n

In his first judgment last month, Mr Justice McAlinden rejected any suggestion of DfC officials dragging their heels or deliberately going slow as \u201ccompletely groundless\u201d.<\/p>\n

Instead, he identified an ongoing failure by the Executive to meet a legislative obligation imposed under the Northern Ireland Act 1998.<\/p>\n

He initially held that Mr Lyons had failed to provide a proper response to his own department\u2019s requests to approve submissions about its responsibilities and actions before the hearing ended in June.<\/p>\n

At that stage Mr Justice McAlinden said no explanation had been given and indicated a declaration would be issued against the Minister to highlight this illegality and irrationality.<\/p>\n

It subsequently emerged, however, Mr Lyons did in fact formally respond back in May this year.<\/p>\n

The Minister signalled he was content for strategies to go to commissioners overseeing the project, but noted that funding and wider Executive agreement is still not in place.<\/p>\n

Evidence of his response only emerged after the first judgment was issued due to a departmental \u201coversight\u201d.<\/p>\n

In a supplementary ruling, Mr Justice McAlinden acknowledged there was no basis for the criticism he had previously directed at Mr Lyons.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe substance of (his) response certainly does not give one any hope that any Irish<\/a> Language Strategy will be presented to the Executive Committee any time soon,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut it has to be said that the response is not significantly out of step with the responses received from a number of other Ministers.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cContrary to my conclusions in the first judgment, I do not consider it either appropriate or necessary to make any form of declaration in relation to the Minister for Communities.\u201d <\/p>\n

Mr Lyons cannot be blamed either for the \u201cunfortunate omission\u201d in failing to inform the court at an earlier stage in proceedings, according to the judge.<\/p>\n

He confirmed: \u201cI am of the view that only one declaratory order should issue in this case and that will issue against the Executive Committee.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Findings of illegality made against Stormont Communities Minister Gordon Lyons in a High Court battle to obtain an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669162,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,2915,13,14,142661,6,36456,11,12,15,16,5,790,93932,7,8,65,66,67],"class_list":["post-669161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-dup","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-gordon-lyons","tag-headlines","tag-irish","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-stormont","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-world","tag-world-news","tag-worldnews"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117202768635673025","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669161\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}