G.M v I.M (Approved)

Woulfe J.������������������������������������������� �������������� Neutral Citation Number [2024] IECA 169

      The background to this issue is as follows.� These judicial review proceedings arose out of very protracted family law proceedings between the same parties, in circumstances where the parties had formerly been in an intimate relationship and have a child together.� The parties have been estranged for a number of years now, and the long running and highly contentious litigation has related primarily to matters such as access by the applicant to their child and payment of maintenance by the applicant.�

      The respondent submits that the Courts have a jurisdiction to restrain a person who has habitually or persistently instituted vexatious or frivolous civil proceedings from bringing any further proceedings without first seeking the leave of the Court to do so, which restraining order is commonly referred to as an Isaac Wunder order.� She refers to certain authorities which state that, in assessing the question of whether the proceedings are vexatious, the Court is entitled to look at the whole history of the matter.�

  In Riordan (No.4) , Keane C.J. summarised the jurisdiction to grant an Isaac Wunder order as follows (at 370):

  In Burke v. Judge Fulham [2010] IEHC 448 (" Burke "), Irvine J. (as she then was) followed certain Canadian authorities when she stated as follows: