A posting that is long overdue but over at GAVC law we have lots of things coming our way and the inevitable consequence is a bit of a queue on the blog. Open Rights Group & Anor, R (On the Application Of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department & Anor [2021] EWCA Civ 1573 was held end of October and discussed remedies for breach of retained EU law, that is in essence, EU law which has force in law in the UK by virtue of the Government’s copy /paste exercise following Brexit.
In April 2021 the CA had held that that the “Immigration Exemption” (which disapplies some data protection rights where their application would be likely to prejudice immigration control) of the UK Data Protection Act 2018 is contrary to Article 23 GDPR and Article 23 of the UK GDPR: [2021] EWCA Civ 800. However in that judgment the CA had not specified at that stage what form of relief should be granted. It does now.
The claim form sought a declaratory order, the effect of which would be to “disapply” the Immigration Exemption. The Government argue it be granted a grace period to make regulations adding to or varying the provisions. The complicating factor is that even retained EU law enjoys supremacy (not by virtue of EU law but by virtue of the Government’s choice to do so). That means that any conflict between the GDPR and domestic legislation (including primary legislation) must be resolved in favour of the former: the domestic legislation must be overridden, treated as invalid or, in the conventional language, disapplied.
[15] A quashing order would not meet with the UK constitutional understanding and its limits to the rule of judges. However must supremacy, post Brexit, mean the courts must inevitably make an immediately binding order? Warby LJ sets out the principles of EU retained law as they follow from domestic legislation (the ‘EUWA’) at [23]:
(1) A UK court must now decide any question as to the validity, meaning or effect of any retained EU law for itself: it is no longer possible to refer any matter to the CJEU: EUWA s 6(1)(b).
(2) But the general rule is that the court must decide any such question in accordance with any retained case law and any retained general principles of EU law that are relevant: EUWA s 6(3). “Retained EU case law” and “retained general principles” mean principles laid down and decisions made by the CJEU before IP completion day.
(3) When it comes to principles laid down or decisions made by the CJEU after IP completion day, the court is not bound (EUWA s 6(1)) but “may have regard” to them (EUWA s 6(2)).
(4) The position is different in a “relevant court”, which includes the Court of Appeal. Subject to an exception that does not apply here, a relevant court is not absolutely bound by any retained EU case law: EUWA s 6(4)(ba) and Regulations 1 and 4. It can depart from that law; but the test to be applied in deciding whether to do so is “the same test as the Supreme Court would apply in deciding whether to depart from the case law of the Supreme Court”: EUWA 6(5A)(c) and Regulation 5.
(5) The test the Supreme Court applies is the one laid down by the House of Lords in its Practice Statement [1966] 1 WLR 1234, when Lord Gardiner LC said
“Their Lordships regard the use of precedent as an indispensable foundation upon which to decide what is the law and its application to individual cases. It provides at least some degree of certainty upon which individuals can rely in the conduct of their affairs, as well as a basis for orderly development of legal rules. Their Lordships nevertheless recognise that too rigid adherence to precedent may lead to injustice in a particular case and also unduly restrict the proper development of the law. They propose, therefore, to modify their present practice and, while treating former decisions of this House as normally binding, to depart from a previous decision when it appears right to do so. In this connection they will bear in mind the danger of disturbing retrospectively the basis on which contracts, settlements of property and fiscal arrangements have been entered into and also the especial need for certainty as to the criminal law. This announcement is not intended to affect the use of precedent elsewhere than in this House.”
Relevant CJEU authority is Liberty: La Quadrature, A v Gewestelijke Stedenbouwkundige Ambtenaar van het Department ruimte Vlaanderen (Case C-24/19) (“Gewestelijke”), and B v Latvijas Republikas Saeima Case C-439/19, EU-C-2021-504 (“B v Latvia”). [24] Gewestelijke was decided before IP completion day. We are not absolutely bound by them, but we should decide this case in accordance with the principles they set out, unless we think it right to depart from those cases for the reasons set out by Lord Gardiner. B v Latvia was decided after IP completion day, so we can “have regard” to it.
[26] Warby LJ suggests 3 options:
One is to hold that since the power to suspend relief in respect of substantive laws that is identified in Gewestelijke is one that can only be exercised by the CJEU, it cannot be exercised at all in E&W. This is rejected [27] as an unduly mechanistic and literal approach, tending to subvert rather than promote the legal policy that underlies this aspect of the CJEU jurisprudence: it would remove from the judicial armoury a power that is, by definition, essential.
An alternative would be what Warby LJ called “the Regulation 5 approach”: to apply the principles laid down in the 1966 HoL Practice Statement and depart from the CJEU case-law, holding that the power which, in that jurisprudence, is reserved to the CJEU should now be treated as available to at least some UK Courts. This [28] enable a court to perform one of its essential tasks: averting legal disorder and is an option which Warby LJ suggests is open to the Court of Appeal.
A third option is to follow and apply the CJEU jurisprudence as to the existence and limits of the power to suspend, but not that aspect of the case-law that reserves the exercise of that power to the European Court. That [31] is Warby LJ’s preferred route however he decides (and the other LJs agree) that there is at this time no need to choose between both options for in essence they lead to the same result in the case at issue. The Court concludes that the Government were given time until 31 January 2022 for the Data Protection Act 2018 to be amended so as to remedy the incompatibility. Whether the Government have done so, I leave to data privacy lawyers to verify.
Underhill LJ emphasises one point [57] ‘that, as Warby LJ says at para. 13 of his judgment, our power to suspend our declaration – in practice, to suspend the disapplication of the Immigration Exemption – derives entirely from retained EU law. It was not argued that the Court had any equivalent power at common law.’
This is an important judgment viz the application of retained EU law but also wider, viz the consequences of judicial review which is a hot topic at the moment in more than just the UK.
Geert.
gavc law - geert van calster 