proportionality
Some More Thoughts on the TWU Litigation
I have been following, via Trinity Western University School of Law’s invaluable Twitter feed, proceedings at the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal: I posted on the first-instance decision here. The questions from the bench on Day One did not augur particularly well for the Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society, but the judges have also probed the […] Read more
You Say “Tomato”, I Say “Reasonableness”: Pham v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2015] UKSC 19
Shortly after a majority of the Supreme Court of Canada wrote that when fundamental rights are engaged by an administrative decision, “reasonableness requires proportionality” (here, at para. 38), the members of the UK Supreme Court said something very similar in Pham v. Secretary of State for the Home Department, [2015] UKSC 19. The case was […] Read more
Reasonableness, Proportionality and Religious Freedom: Loyola High School v. Quebec (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 12
Where an administrative decision-maker has violated a fundamental right, how should courts review the decision? Should they apply the standards of constitutional law (a proportionality test, for example)? Or should they apply the standard grounds of administrative law (such as reasonableness)? The Supreme Court of Canada has written more than most on this question and […] Read more
David Miranda and the Constraints of the “Prescribed by Law” Requirement: Miranda v. Home Secretary, [2014] EWHC 255
Laws L.J. delivered the judgment of the Divisional Court yesterday in Miranda v. Home Secretary, [2014] EWHC 255, a judgment explained by Rosalind English and Carl Gardner, and aspects of which have also been discussed by Fiona de Londras and Colin Murray. Miranda, en route to Berlin to share confidential information with a journalist, was […] Read more
First Principles: Substantive and Procedural Review on the UKSC
The decision of the UK Supreme Court in Bank Mellat v Her Majesty’s Treasury (No. 2) [2013] UKSC 39 is not exactly ground-breaking as a matter of law, and is certainly the poor relation of Bank Mellat (No. 1), UKSC 38 (see e.g. here), but it is nonetheless a very interesting case on the application […] Read more
The Charter and Administrative Adjudication
The Supreme Court of Canada has been feverishly productive in the field of administrative law since the Fall of 2011, rendering decisions on standard of review (questions of law, jurisdictional error and labour arbitrators), the right to reasons, issue estoppel, attempts to pre-empt the administrative decision-making process, and review of municipal by-laws. Plenty of grist […] Read more