Wednesbury unreasonableness
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In English law, Wednesbury unreasonableness is unreasonableness of an administrative decision that is so extreme that courts may intervene to correct it. The term derives from Associated Provincial Picture Houses v. Wednesbury Corporation [1948] 1 KB 223, where the court stated that it would not intervene to correct a bad administrative decision on grounds of its unreasonableness unless the decision was, as articulated in Council of Civil Service Unions v. Minister for the Civil Service (the GCHQ case) [1985] AC 374, 410 per Lord Diplock, "So outrageous in its defiance of logic or accepted moral standards that no sensible person who had applied his mind to the question to be decided could have arrived at it."
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[edit] Facts of the case
"Associated Provincial Picture Houses" were granted a licence by the defendant local authority to operate a cinema if no children under 15 were admitted to the cinema. The claimants sought a declaration that such a condition was unacceptable, and outside the power of the Wednesbury Corporation to impose. The court held that for it to intervene and overturn the decision of the defendant corporation, the condition would have to be so unreasonable that no reasonable authority would ever consider imposing it. The court held that such a condition did not fall into the category of being so unreasonable that it would not be reasonably considered by such a public authority. Therefore, the claim failed and the decision of the Wednesbury Corporation was upheld.
[edit] Use of this case
This case or the principle known as "Wednesbury unreasonableness" are cited in English courts as a reason for courts to be hesitant to interfere into the decisions of administrative law bodies.
In recent times, particulary as a result of the enactment of the Human Rights Act 1998, the judiciary have resiled from this strict abstentionist approach, recognising that in certain circumstances it is necessary for them to undertake a more searching review of administrative decisions. Indeed, the European Court of Human Rights now require the reviewing court to subject the original decision to "anxious scrutiny" when an administrative measure infinges a Convention right. In order to justify such an intrusion, the Respondents will have to show that it pursued a "pressing social need" and that the means employed to achieve this were proportionate to the limitation of the right.
[edit] See also
- Compare: patently unreasonable, fairness, fundamental justice and due process.
- In the United States, a similarly dominant case is Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, .
