The Quinn family are concerned to ensure a dispute over the method of analysing some 700,000 documents for Irish Bank Resolution Corporation’s action against members of the family does not delay their own action against the bank. It is aimed at avoiding liability for some €2.34 billion in loans, the Commercial Court has heard.

Mr Justice Peter Kelly yesterday fixed for hearing in October the application by IBRC for court sanction for analysis of the documents by technology assisted review (TAR) rather than by manual analysis. This is a new form of analysis never before used in the Irish courts.

Karyn Harty, solicitor for IBRC, said in an affidavit the TAR process is “very efficient and very accurate” and involved a computer “learning” what document is, or is not, relevant from expert practitioners who code randomly selected documents for relevance.

The Quinns and two related Middle Eastern firms expressed concerns about the proposal. The two firms are being sued with various Quinn family members over allegedly conspiring to place substantial assets beyond the bank’s reach.

When the matter came before Mr Justice Kelly yesterday he was told the number of documents at issue had been reduced from some 1.6 million to about 700,000 because a large number were not amenable to the TAR method.

Jarlath Ryan, for Senat FZC and Senat Legal Consultancy FZ LLC, said they were opposed to the proposal.

The judge made directions for the exchange of legal documents between the sides with a view to hearing the matter on October 16th.