Boland v an Taoiseach

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judgment Date: 01 January 1975
• Date: 01 January 1975
• Docket Number: [1973 No. 3289 P.]
• Court: Supreme Court

(S.C.)

Boland

and

An Taoiseach

International relations - Conference between Irish and British governments - Agreed communiqué issued -Whether Irish government party to unconstitutional agreement - Whether courts had power to review actions of government - Constitution of Ireland, 1937, Articles 2, 3, 6, 15, 28, 29, 34.

On the 6-9th December, 1973, a conference was held at Sunningdale in England between the Irish and British governments and the parties involved in the Northern Ireland Executive (designate). During the conference the parties discussed the establishment of a Council of Ireland confined to representatives of the two parts of Ireland, and they decided to commence studying the problems involved so as to identify and, prior to the formal stage of the conference, report on, areas of common interest in relation to which a Council of Ireland would take executive decisions. At the conclusion of the first stage of the conference the parties issued an agreed communiqué which contained at clause 5 a statement by the Irish government to the effect that they fully accepted and solemnly declared that there could be no change in the status of Northern Ireland until a majority of the people of Northern Ireland desired a change in that status; and a statement by the British government to the effect that it was, and would remain, their policy to support the wishes of the majority of the people of Northern Ireland, that the present status of Northern Ireland was that it was part of the United Kingdom, and that, if in the future the majority of the people of Northern Ireland should indicate a wish to become part of a united Ireland, the British government would support that wish. Clause 6 of the communiqué stated that the conference had agreed that a formal agreement, incorporating the declarations in clause 5, would be signed at the formal stage of the conference and registered at the...