James McMahon Ltd v Dunne and Another

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judgment Date: 01 January 1965
• Date: 01 January 1965
• Court: High Court

(H.C.)

James McMahon Ltd

and

Dunne and Another

Inducement to commit breach of contract with third party - Trade dispute alleged to exist - No dispute between plaintiffs and own employees - Questions of law involved -Application for interlocutory injunction - Trade Disputes Act, 1906, s. 3.

The plaintiffs, a firm of timber merchants and builders providers, carrying on business in Limerick, bad entered into contracts with foreign firms for the purchase and sale of timber to be delivered to the plaintiffs at Dublin. Ten lots of these goods arrived at the port of Dublin during the months of August, September and October, 1964. These goods were discharged from the ships, placed on the dock, and paid for. The plaintiffs, having sought to obtain delivery of these goods, alleged that they bad been prevented from obtaining delivery and that the vendors of the goods had been prevented from effecting delivery of the goods and from performing their contract by reason of an embargo which the defendants bad placed on the removal of all building materials from this port for the purpose of implementing a trade dispute alleged to exist between workers employed by certain builders' providers in the Dublin area and their employers. Certain matters of fact relevant to the proceedings were in dispute but it was proved by affidavit that no one of the plaintiffs' employees was a member of the Marine, Port and General Workers' Union and that the plaintiffs had no trade dispute with their employees, and no trade dispute existed between the plaintiffs and the defendants or the Marine, Port and General Workers' Union. In these circumstances the plaintiffs alleged the tort of unlawfully inducing a breach of commercial contracts and an unlawful interference with the plaintiffs' trade or business had been committed by the defendants. The plaintiffs issued proceedings against the defendant JamesDunne who was the General Secretary of The Marine, Port and General Workers' Union, and the defendant Patrick Dolan a member of that union and a head checker employed at the port of Dublin, claiming, inter alia, an injunction to restrain the defendants and their servants and agents, in combination or otherwise, from interfering with or preventing the performance of certain contracts between the plaintiffs and certain firms (named in the summons) or from procuring or inducing breaches of the said contracts. Having obtained an interim injunction in...