A HEARING INTO Enoch Burke’s 2023 dismissal by Wilson’s Hospital School will take place tomorrow after the teacher failed in a last-minute bid to have it postponed.

Burke applied to the Court of Appeal today to put a stay on the hearing of the Disciplinary Appeals Panel (DAP), which is due to take place in Athlone on Saturday.

Burke is on administrative leave following his dismissal for gross misconduct after he interrupted a religious service and confronted the school’s principal.

He has argued that he is being persecuted for his religious opposition to a request by the school to address a transgender pupil by their preferred pronouns.

He is currently in Mountjoy Prison for contempt of court after disobeying a High Court injunction to stay away from the school’s grounds. 

A judge said this week that Burke could be released from prison any time he purges his contempt, or when the DAP decides on whether he was fairly or unfairly dismissed by Wilson’s Hospital School.

If the panel decides against him after it meets tomorrow, Burke’s dismissal for gross misconduct will be confirmed. 

Appearing in court in person today, Burke argued that the hearing should be postponed because of “diametrically opposing” statements by different judges in two previous Court of Appeal judgments about why he was dismissed by the school.

He said he was making his application on the basis that he had asked the Supreme Court to resolve the two judgments, and that without this, the DAP would be making its decision on a questionable basis.

One of the judgments, a 2023 ruling by Judge John Edwards, said there was “no evidence” Burke was placed on administrative leave by Wilson’s Hospital School “because of the views that he holds”.

Burke claimed that the school’s board of management had overly relied on this judgment in its submission to the DAP, saying the board had quoted it 12 times in a 20-page submission.

He said that Judge Edwards’ statement in the judgment was “ringing with totality, ringing with absolutism, [and] ringing with authority”.

If tomorrow’s hearing went ahead, he said, the same statement would “ring in the ears of the Board of Management, [and] it will ring in the ears of the Disciplinary Appeals Panel” and that he would therefore suffer “irreparable harm”.

“How can that be allowed to proceed, that I would have to go into a hearing with my career on the line and everything on the line?” he asked the court.

“It is unthinkable that that could happen.”

The second judgment cited by Burke was made earlier this year by Judge Mary Faherty, in which he specifically highlighted a paragraph relating to a report by the school’s then-principal about his dismissal.

Burke argued that Judge Faherty said “any reasonable reader” of the principal’s report would find he was sacked after refusing to obey a request to address a transgender pupil by their preferred pronouns.

However, the three-judge court ruled today that the DAP would not be unduly prejudiced by Edwards’ judgment if it met tomorrow.

It said it was satisfied that neither Court of Appeal judgment had determined anything about the reasons for Burke’s sacking, and that the reasons behind his dismissal would be determined by the DAP.

The judges also said that both Burke and the school could make their case before the panel, and that it was the legal obligation of the DAP – not the court – to determine the reasons for his dismissal.