Enoch Burke wins High Court permission to challenge failed employment appeal
High Court Reporters
Teacher Enoch Burke alleges bias and breach of fair procedure in a fresh High Court challenge against a decision refusing to reinstate his employment at Wilson's Hospital School.
At the High Court on Tuesday, Burke was granted permission to bring judicial review proceedings against three members of the Disciplinary Appeal Panel (DAP), the Minister for Education and the Board of Management of Wilson's Hospital School.
The three respondent members of the DAP are listed as chair Claire Callanan, John Irwin and Seamus Lahart.
The Co Westmeath school suspended – and later dismissed – Burke over his conduct towards the then-principal Niamh McShane at a school religious event in June 2022.
The disagreement arose in circumstances where Ms McShane had earlier requested teachers to address one teenage student by a new name, and to use the pronouns “they” and “them”.
Burke, an evangelical Christian, has maintained that this request went against his religious beliefs.
Thereafter, the school successfully sought court orders banning him from the premises, which he continuously breached.
Burke has previously spent over 700 days in prison in separate spells, arising from his contempt of the court order barring him from presenting at the school.
He has also amassed outstanding fines in the region of €200K imposed by the courts.
He was formally dismissed from his position for alleged gross misconduct after an appeal last May found his challenge to his dismissal had failed.
Burke is challenging that decision and the procedure underpinning the appeal.
Burke, in an ex parte application to the court - where only one side is represented - seeks an order quashing both the opinion and decision of the DAP of May 2026 over his "purported dismissal" from his teaching post at the school.
He further states that Ms Callanan, the DAP chair, should have recused herself from the DAP because she and her husband, Lyndon McCann SC hold positions within the Church of Ireland.
He states that Wilson's is a Church of Ireland School with archbishops and bishops of that denomination as trustees, guardians and patrons.
In the submissions to the court, it is stated that McCann holds senior and influential offices at the apex of the Church of Ireland" and has a "close relationship" with trustees and guardians of the school and others connected to the school.
The submissions continue: "Ms Callanan's position within the Church of Ireland and her relationship of marriage to Mr McCann means that a reasonable apprehension of bias arises in respect of her chairing the applicant's DAP appeal."
He adds that an impartial observer would have a reasonable apprehension that Ms Callanan could not approach the appeal from a neutral and unbiased standpoint.
Mr Burke further submits that as a lay litigant, he should not have been subject to an appeal hearing whereby the State put him at an "unfair disadvantage" by allowing a solicitor and a barrister to oppose and cross-examine him at his internal appeal hearing.
Judge Cian Ferriter granted permission to Mr Burke to pursue his judicial review and adjourned the matter to October.
