Motorists using a stretch of the M1 motorway are being over-charged by €26,000 a week since January 1st and will be overcharged by some €1.39 million this year unless the tolls are reduced, the National Roads Authority has claimed.
Some 11 million vehicles used the M1 toll road last year, the Commercial Court heard today.
The NRA claims motorists using other motorway routes will also be over-charged if its interpretation of the relevant bye-laws is correct.
Those routes are the N8 Rathcormac/Fermoy by-pass; the N25 Waterford by-pass and the M4 Kinnegad-Enfield-Kilcock motorway.
Among various claims of the NRA, it rejects arguments the relevant bye-laws provide solely for upwards-only revision of toll charges. It claims the tolls being imposed are in excess of the maximum tolls chargeable under the appropriate formula provided for in the bye-laws.
Lawyers for the defendant M1 toll operator today queried the consistency of the NRA’s own conduct in relation to the relevant bye-laws. Maurice Collins SC, for Celtic Roads Group (Dundalk) Ltd (CRGD), said the NRA was itself effectively the operator of the M50 and appeared not to have to have reduced tolls there.
Declan McGrath, for the NRA, said there was no inconsistency between how tolls were applied to the M50 and the NRA’s interpretation of what should apply in relation to the M1 and other motorways. The issue for the court to determine was the proper construction of the relevant bye-laws and the NRA wanted the matter heard urgently, he argued.
Mr Justice Peter Kelly noted, if the NRA was correct, it was accepted there was no means whereby overcharged motorists would be compensated. In those circumstances, the action should be heard urgently. He fixed it for hearing on February 22nd.
The NRA’s proceedings are against Celtic Roads Group (Dundalk) Ltd over whether that company has breached the relevant bye-laws in its toll charges for this year on the Gormanstown to Monasterboice stretch of the M1 motorway.
The NRA claims the defendant company will receiver some €1.39 million this year for charging tolls in excess of what the NRA contends should be the maximum tolls. It claims, according to its calculations, toll charges should have been reduced from January 1st last and, for example, the toll per car should be €1.80, not €1.90 as of now.
Mr Collins, for CRGD, said his side believed there were issues about the NRA’s own operation of the M50 route and about what it had accepted concerning other routes and he would be seeking documents from the NRA to that effect.
He agreed the case was essentially about the proper construction of the relevant bye-laws but said there may also be issues about the NRA’s previous stance on these matters and whether the M50 bye-laws have been operated in the same way. It seemed tolls on the M50 had not been reduced, he said.
The NRA could not argue for a particular construction of a bye-law if it operated those in the same way, counsel said.
