THE DISCIPLINARY APPEALS panel (DAP) that is considering Enoch Burke’s dismissal has agreed not to meet this weekend following a High Court application by the teacher.

The three-member panel last met before Christmas and was due to reconvene on Saturday to determine whether Burke was fairly dismissed by Wilson’s Hospital School.

Burke is currently in Mountjoy Prison for contempt of court after repeatedly breaching injunctions ordering him to stay away from the school.

He was jailed for the fourth time before Christmas and has spent more than 500 days in prison arising from various contempt orders.

High Court Judge Brian Cregan said in December that the panel’s recommendation could see Burke freed from prison, either because it finds in his favour – in which case he will be able to return to work – or because it finds against him – in which case it will end Burke’s “self-created legal fiction” that he is still employed by the school.

However, Burke applied to the High Court this week for an injunction that would restrain the panel from issuing its recommendation or taking any further steps in the appeals process.

He argued in an affidavit against the inclusion of certain individuals on the panel, and claimed that aspects of December’s hearing damaged his prospects of winning his appeal.

The court heard Burke’s application this morning. A barrister for the DAP agreed to postpone the hearing on an interim basis to allow its members to formally respond to the claims made by the teacher in his affidavit.

Senior Counsel Padraic Lyons told the court that the matter could then be addressed later this month, and that no further steps would be taken by the panel until that happened.

Despite the DAP agreeing not to meet this weekend, Burke complained to Judge Emily Farrell that his application for an injunction would not get a full hearing today.

He claimed he had served the panel on Monday, giving its members enough time to respond before today, and that they were now “kicking this down the road for two weeks” when the matter “should be over this morning”.

Lyons told the judge that the three individuals on the DAP were not “professional members of the panel” and “have other things in their lives”, so were not in a position to respond in recent days.

Judge Farrell said she did not accept there was any prejudice to Burke, and said it was in the interests of justice to allow the panel to respond to the claims in his affidavit.

She adjourned the case until 21 January and agreed to make a production order to allow Burke to attend the High Court if he is still in prison on that date.