By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Opponents of Bimini’s controversial cruise ship dock have switched tactics, filing a Supreme Court summons seeking permission to drop Resorts World Bimini and its affiliates as defendants in its Judicial Review action.

The move by Bimini Blue Coalition is designed to “minimise its exposure to further costs” that Resorts World Bimini may seek to recover from it as a result of the Judicial Review proceedings.

And it is also likely designed to speed the case’s progress through the court system, ensuring it does not become bogged down - as has happened with many previous Judicial Reviews - by preliminary ‘security for costs’ applications, and other attempts by the Government and developers to strike such actions out.

The Coalition, meanwhile, is seeking to overturn the collective $650,000 ‘security for costs’ Order made against it by Justice Hartman Longley on the grounds that this sum is “excessive and irrational”.

In filings for the March 25, 2014, hearing before the Court of Appeal, the Bimini Blue Coalition is seeking an Order that the costs awards made against it be reduced to zero.

Justice Longley previously ordered that the Coalition pay $250,000 as security for the Government’s legal costs, and $400,000 to cover those that would likely be incurred by Resorts World in opposing the Judicial Review action.

However, in filings by its attorneys Ferreira & Company, the Coalition alleged: “The sum of $250,000 ordered by the learned senior judge was excessive and irrational.”

It based its arguments on the fact that the Government is represented by the Attorney General’s Office, whose attorneys are paid salaries, and the fact it is not paying private attorneys to assist it.

The Bimini Blue Coalition further alleged that the $250,000 award was “oppressive and arbitrary” because no evidence was provided to support this amount.

“No draft Bill of costs was produced by the Government respondents as is the usual practice,” it claimed.

“The learned judge ordered the amount of $250,000 based on his ‘own knowledge of these matters’. There was no material before the judge upon which such knowledge was based. In any event, each case must be based on its own facts.”

The Bimini Blue Coalition alleged that the Government had not provided evidence to show it had incurred $65,000 in legal costs defending the Judicial Review action to-date, and there was nothing to support its claim that “a considerable amount of evidence and costly technical expertise” would be required if the case was to proceed.

And it also challenged the Government’s total legal cost estimates of $1 million, saying this was based on another Judicial Review action involving different issues.

Summing up, the Coalition alleged that the $250,000 sum would have prevented “their serious and well-founded concerns, raised in good faith and in the public interest, from being heard and investigated”.

“The learned judge’s decision to order security for costs at such a high level is contrary to authority on access to Judicial Review for groups acting in the public interest, and sets a precedent for access to the courts and be denied in future cases brought in the public interest,” the Bimini Blue Coalition alleged.

“The learned judge’s decision to award such a substantial sum on a security for costs application effectively seeks to overturn by the back door settled law on the standing of campaigning and other public interest associations to bring Judicial Review proceedings and therefore runs directly contrary to such well-established authority.”

The Bimini Blue Coalition argued that its Judicial Review chances of success were “very good indeed”, and that its action “raises issues of such gravity and importance” that it was in the public interest for the case to be heard.

As for the $400,000 award in Resorts World Bimini’s favour, the Coalition said this should be reduced to zero because it was dropping its action against them - only proceeding against the Government.

It added that the developers were only named as parties to given them “an opportunity to be heard”, as the injunction previously sought would have stopped all construction and dredging work related to the Bimini cruise ship terminal and jetty.