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Justifying Bancoult (No 2): Why Justice Hercules Must Sometimes Disappoint Us

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Fifty Years of the British Indian Ocean Territory

Part of the book series: The World of Small States ((WSS,volume 4))

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Abstract

This essay considers how Justice Hercules, the personification of Ronald Dworkin’s anti-positivist, interpretative theory of law, might assess the judicial reasoning in Bancoult (No 2). If, as Hercules contends, legal reasoning is a subset of moral reasoning, rooted in the legal and constitutional traditions of the United Kingdom, then I suggest that he may have reason to favour the majority judgments. The underlying moral scheme of these judgments arguably captures the historical settlement between the Crown and the courts in relation to prerogative powers. Whether or not that conclusion is correct, an interpretative reading of the judgments places the judicial disagreements in Bancoult (No 2) in a fresh light. It answers many of the positivist-inspired objections to the majority reasoning. And it reveals the differences between the judges to be, not an uncompromising ‘clash of legal cultures’ between executive authority and individual liberty, but a common attempt by the judges to contribute to what Kyritsis calls a ‘joint project of governing’: a collaborative effort on the part of each branch of government to fashion, through law, a shared vision of justice and institutional responsibility. That shared vision may fall short of what judges, and we, think justice ideally requires; but I contend that we can legitimately expect no more of legality and adjudication.

I presented a paper with a passing resemblance to this one in the workshop, Fifty Years of the British Indian Ocean Territory Conference Queen Mary, University of London, November 12, 2015. I am very grateful for the questions and comments I received at this event. I also extend my thanks to Thomas Fairclough, Dimitris Kyritsis, Neville Filar, Chris Monaghan, Stephen Allen, Trevor Allan and an anonymous reviewer for their extremely helpful comments and criticisms.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    R (Bancoult) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (No 2) [2008] UKHL 61, [2008] 3 WLR 955.

  2. 2.

    British Indian Ocean Territory (Constitution) Order 2004.

  3. 3.

    R (Bancoult) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs [2006] EWHC 1038 (Admin); R (Bancoult) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs [2007] EWCA Civ 498, [2008] QB 365.

  4. 4.

    Lord Hoffmann said: ‘[T]he fact that Orders in Council in certain important respects resemble Acts of Parliament does not mean that they share all their characteristics. The principle of the sovereignty of Parliament, as it has been developed by the courts over the past 350 years, is founded upon the unique authority Parliament derives from its representative character. An exercise of the prerogative lacks this quality; although it may be legislative in character, it is still an exercise of power by the executive alone.’ [35].

  5. 5.

    A rare but highly influential argument in support of the reasoning adopted by Lord Rodger and Carswell is found in Finnis (2008).

  6. 6.

    See Allan (2013), p. 291.

  7. 7.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), PL 697–722.

  8. 8.

    Arvind (2012), p. 113–151.

  9. 9.

    See Dworkin (1978, 1986a, b, 2006, 2011) and Allan (2013).

  10. 10.

    Kyritsis (2015b).

  11. 11.

    Arvind (2012), p. 138.

  12. 12.

    ibid 135.

  13. 13.

    As oppose to a ‘hard’ or ‘unregulated’ case in which the law is clearly in dispute. See e.g. Raz (1979), pp. 181–194.

  14. 14.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [70]–[71] (Lord Bingham); [150] (Lord Mance).

  15. 15.

    ibid [69] citing Entick v Carrington (1765) 19 State Tr 1030, 1066.

  16. 16.

    Campbell v Hall (1774) Lofft 655, 741–42; 98 ER 848.

  17. 17.

    ibid ‘Under the King’s protection… subjects and are to be universally considered in that light, not as enemies or aliens’. Lord Mance found further evidence for a right of abode in section 4(3) of the Immigration Ordinance 2000, which allowed the Chagossians to return to the outer islands of BIOT.

  18. 18.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [172]; and see Bancoult (CA) (n 3) [71] (Sedley LJ).

  19. 19.

    Arvind (2012), p. 138.

  20. 20.

    ibid 126.

  21. 21.

    ibid.

  22. 22.

    Above (n 16).

  23. 23.

    Arvind (2012), p. 129.

  24. 24.

    ibid 126, following the reasoning in Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [40) (Lords Hoffmann) and [142] (Lord Mance).

  25. 25.

    Arvind (2012), p. 132. ‘[The distinction is] too fine to be serviceable’, Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [39] (Lord Hoffmann).

  26. 26.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 704.

  27. 27.

    ibid. Philips v Eyre (1870) L.R. 6 Q.B. 1., cited by Lord Rodger in Bancoult (HL) (n 1) at [97].

  28. 28.

    Liyanage v The Queen [1967] 1 AC 259.

  29. 29.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 703.

  30. 30.

    Arvind (2012), p. 132.

  31. 31.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [95]–[96] (Lord Rodger).

  32. 32.

    Arvind (2012), p. 127–128.

  33. 33.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 702.

  34. 34.

    ibid, footnote 19. Pepper (Inspector of Taxes) v Hart [1993] A.C. 593 HL, setting out the limited conditions under which courts can have recourse to Hansard.

  35. 35.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [45] (Lord Hoffmann) ‘The law gives it and the law may take it away’.

  36. 36.

    ibid [35].

  37. 37.

    ibid.

  38. 38.

    Arvind (2012), p. 135.

  39. 39.

    ibid. See also Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 720.

  40. 40.

    Arvind (2012), p. 135.

  41. 41.

    ibid 125.

  42. 42.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [157] (Lord Mance) supporting the reasoning of the Court of Appeal that ‘the permanent exclusion of an entire population from its homeland for reasons unconnected with their collective well-being cannot have [the] character [of governance] and accordingly cannot be lawfully accomplished by use of the prerogative power of governance’ Bancoult (CA) (n 3) [67] (Sedley LJ).

  43. 43.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [107] (Lord Rodger).

  44. 44.

    Most notably Union Steamship Co of Australia Pty Ltd v King (1988) 166 C.L.R. 1. Lord Hoffmann also cites (at Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [31]) an entry from Halsbury’s Laws of England, 4th ed reissue, vol 6 (2003), para 823, which refers to the ‘full power’ of the Crown.

  45. 45.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [108] (Lord Hoffmann).

  46. 46.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 708.

  47. 47.

    Arvind (2012), p. 132.

  48. 48.

    Council of Civil Service Unions v Minister for the Civil Service [1985] AC 374 (‘GCHQ’). On one reading, the ruling in GCHQ permitted review of powers exercised under an Order in Council (the type of power involved in the GCHQ itself) but did not permit a direct attack on an Order in Council.

  49. 49.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 704. The point made by Elliott and Perreau-Saussine here is that the principles of judicial review cannot derive from statute where prerogative powers are in question. For the classical argument to this effect, see Oliver (2000), pp. 3–27.

  50. 50.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [103] (Lord Rodger).

  51. 51.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 703.

  52. 52.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [15] (Lord Hoffmann).

  53. 53.

    ibid [58].

  54. 54.

    ibid [109].

  55. 55.

    ibid [130].

  56. 56.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 704. Similarly, Allan comments that the standard of review applied by the majority judges ‘render[ed] the Constitution Order impregnable’ and reduced ‘[r]ationality… to whatever the Crown thought fit as regards the need of defence or expediency…’ See Allan (2013), p. 290.

  57. 57.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [72].

  58. 58.

    The provision made for resettlement was the Immigration Ordinance No 4 of 2000.

  59. 59.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [168] (Lord Mance).

  60. 60.

    ibid [15] (Lord Hoffmann).

  61. 61.

    ibid 172] (Lord Mance).

  62. 62.

    Bancoult (CA) (n 3) [51] (Sedley LJ).

  63. 63.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 706.

  64. 64.

    I say ‘loosely’ because legal positivism is notoriously difficult to pin down as a single theory of law. For a brilliant attempt to do so, see Gardner (2001), p. 199.

  65. 65.

    See Raz (1979), passim.

  66. 66.

    See, for instance, Gordon (2015), chapter 1; Waldron (1994) and Campbell (2004).

  67. 67.

    For an excellent overview of legal interpretivism, see Stavropolous (2017). See, generally, Dworkin (1978, 1986a, b, 2006, 2011); Allan (2013), especially chapter 1 and the appendix. Kyritsis (2015b).

  68. 68.

    There is copious literature on this topic. For a helpful and insightful overview, see Dickson (2004), p. 117.

  69. 69.

    It will be unacceptable to those philosophers who propound a universal theory of law for all legal systems at all times. The seminal rendition of this approach is Hart (1994). For a critique of Hart’s universalist ambitions from within the positivist framework, see Cane (2013), p. 1–26. For a critique from the perspective of legal interpretivism, see Dworkin (2006), chapter 6.

  70. 70.

    R (Bancoult) v Secretary of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office [2001] QB 1067.

  71. 71.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [90] (Lord Rodger); [125] (Lord Carswell).

  72. 72.

    This is a simplified version of Ronald Dworkin’s ‘semantic sting’ argument. See Dworkin (1986b), pp. 45–46.

  73. 73.

    As Hart puts it, there will often be a ‘penumbra of uncertainty’ surrounding the core of certainty of legal rules, see Hart (1994), pp. 134–135.

  74. 74.

    On the possibility of conflicts of rules, see Raz (1999), pp. 146–148.

  75. 75.

    See Gardner (2001), pp. 199–200.

  76. 76.

    This is not to say that legal positivists do not acknowledge many important connections between law and morality. See, for instance, HLA Hart, ‘Positivism and the Separation of Law and Morals’ in Hart (1983), pp 54–56.

  77. 77.

    Raz (1986), chapters 2–4.

  78. 78.

    As Raz puts it, while exclusionary reasons are necessarily legally valid, such reasons are not always conclusive. See Raz (1999), pp. 27–28.

  79. 79.

    See Kavanagh (2010), pp. 23–40, arguing that judges may on occasion decide that (say) the reputation of the court gives reason for the court not to enforce the law.

  80. 80.

    On the incommensurability of values, see Raz (1986), chapter 13; Da Silva (2011), pp. 273–302.

  81. 81.

    Arvind (2012), p. 117. Legal formalism and legal positivism are distinct but related theories. See footnote 90 below. Schauer (1988), p. 509, footnote 81 and passim. Nothing hangs on the distinction for the purposes of the article, hence the terms where they appear may be read interchangeably.

  82. 82.

    Arvind (2102), p. 117.

  83. 83.

    ibid.

  84. 84.

    Posner (2003), pp. 61–71 cited by Arvind (2012), footnote 114.

  85. 85.

    Posner (1993), pp. 42–61 cited by Arvind (2012), footnote 116.

  86. 86.

    Arvind (2012), p. 137.

  87. 87.

    ibid.

  88. 88.

    ibid 111.

  89. 89.

    This binary understanding of legal reasoning is far stricter than the view taken by most legal positivists. Hart warned against the extremes of legal formalism (the view that Arvind embraces) and rule scepticism. It is neither the case, Hart said, that all questions of law are governed by clear rules, nor that there are no legal rule at all. See Hart (1994), chapter 7.

  90. 90.

    See Dworkin (1978), Model of Rules I and II.

  91. 91.

    Arvind’s concedes as much in his survey of recent case law. See, Arvind (2012), pp. 144–146.

  92. 92.

    For a fine illustration of this phenomenon, see Oliver (1999).

  93. 93.

    Arvind (2012), p. 146.

  94. 94.

    For this same type of argument in a different context, see Dworkin (1978), Model of Rules I and II.

  95. 95.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [106] (Lord Rodger).

  96. 96.

    See Dworkin (1986b), chapter 5; (2006), chapter 1.

  97. 97.

    Arvind (2012), footnote 115.

  98. 98.

    ibid 145.

  99. 99.

    Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [136]. One finds similar sentiments in the other majority judgments. The ‘brutal realities of global politics’ [24], ‘callous disregard’ [10], ‘unhappy-indeed, in many respects, disgraceful-events’ [75].

  100. 100.

    Contrary to the view of Arvind (2012), pp. 138 et seq.

  101. 101.

    In more philosophical language, these features tell him that law is an interpretative concept rather than a criterial concept. For this distinction, see Dworkin (2006), chapter 8.

  102. 102.

    See Dworkin (1986b), chapter 7.

  103. 103.

    This is a simplified version of Ronald Dworkin’s theory of law as integrity: ‘[a]ccording to law as integrity, propositions of law are true if they figure in or follow from the principles of justice, fairness, and procedural process that provide the best constructive interpretation of the community’s legal practice’. ibid 225.

  104. 104.

    See Dworkin (1978), Model of Rules I and II.

  105. 105.

    Dworkin (1986a), chapter 6.

  106. 106.

    See Postema (1987), pp. 283–319.

  107. 107.

    See Allan (2013), passim.

  108. 108.

    For a good example of this type of rule-based reasoning about rights and judicial review, see Elliott (2015), pp. 85–117.

  109. 109.

    For this type of compartmentalisation in public law, see, for instance, Cane (2016), chapter 6.

  110. 110.

    Allan (2013), p. 289.

  111. 111.

    Allan rejects the conventional judicial review labels as being ‘misleading, indeed conceptually confused’. Ibid 287. See further Allan (2003), pp. 563–584, 567 and 572, objecting to the distinction between the grounds of review and their application. Cf. Craig (2004), p. 237.

  112. 112.

    Allan (2013), p. 287.

  113. 113.

    Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 706 referring to Lord Carswell’s reasoning in Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [125].

  114. 114.

    Ibid 718, citing Orwell (1992), p. 223. Elliott and Perreau-Saussine define “double-think” as a ‘self-consciously irrational preparedness to hold two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously and accept both’.

  115. 115.

    Poole (2010), pp. 81 and 103.

  116. 116.

    So much is suggested by both Sedley LJ and Lord Hoffmann by their flexible understanding of the Wednesbury review. Bancoult (HL) [35] (Lord Hoffmann) and Bancoult (CA) [38] (Sedley LJ). For a positive argument that the judicial assessment of prerogative powers should be referable to a rationality standard of review, see Sales (2015), chapter 14.

  117. 117.

    See Allan (2013), chapter 5.

  118. 118.

    ibid.

  119. 119.

    Bancoult (HL) [149] (Lord Mance), applying a dictum of Lord Reid in Burmah Oil Co (Burma Trading) Ltd v Lord Advocate [1965] AC 75, 101D.

  120. 120.

    See Dworkin (1986b), chapter 7. For an insightful comparison of positivist and anti-positivist theories of common law reasoning, see Hershovitz (2008).

  121. 121.

    See, for instance, S Hurley, ‘Coherence, Hypothetical Cases, and Precedent’ in S. Hershovitz Exploring Law’s Empire op. cit, Stavropolous (2017).

  122. 122.

    This, I suggest, is how Justice Hercules would explain the contrast between the majority approach to precedent in Bancoult (No 2) and that taken by Nourse LJ in R. v. Secretary of State for Home Department, ex p. Northumbria Police Authority [1989] Q.B. 26. In the latter case, the judge (at p 58) said that the absence of clear precedent on whether a prerogative power to keep the peace existed may suggest an assumption that is does (the reverse of Lord Bingham’s approach in Bancoult (No 2). See, Moules (2009), p. 14 at 16.

  123. 123.

    See Cohn (2009), pp. 260–286.

  124. 124.

    See Bancoult (CA) (n 3) [44] (Sedley LJ). See further Allan (2013), p. 77.

  125. 125.

    See, generally, Dyzenhaus (2006) passim, but especially chapter 3.

  126. 126.

    Allan (2013), pp. 292–293.

  127. 127.

    Bancoult (CA) (n 3) [Sedley LJ [67]–[68] ruling that the ‘governance of each colonial territory is in constitutional principle a discrete function of the Crown…’ Cf. Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [49] (Lord Hoffmann): ‘No doubt [Her Majesty in Council] is also required to take into account the interests of the colony…’

  128. 128.

    Allan (2013), pp. 294 and 296.

  129. 129.

    ibid 299.

  130. 130.

    Bancoult (HL) [72] (Lord Bingham).

  131. 131.

    See Tomkins (2001), p. 571 describing this distinction as an ‘ancient and formal nicety’ (at 579), quoted in Bancoult (HL) (n 1) [40] (Lord Rodger).

  132. 132.

    Dworkin (2003), chapter 2; Waldron (2003) p. 191; and Allan (2013), p. 294.

  133. 133.

    ibid. Bancoult (CA) [67] (Sedley LJ).

  134. 134.

    Allan (2013), chapter 7.

  135. 135.

    Cohn (2009), p. 262.

  136. 136.

    ibid 278–280.

  137. 137.

    Bancoult (HL) [69] (Lord Bingham).

  138. 138.

    See Finnis (2015), p. 12.

  139. 139.

    See Poole (2016).

  140. 140.

    Bancoult (CA) (n 3) [86]–[89] (Waller LJ).

  141. 141.

    Poole (2010), pp. 86–87.

  142. 142.

    See Locke and Laslett (2003), chapter XII.

  143. 143.

    See Dyzenhaus (2006) and Poole (2016), Cf. Vile (2012), p. 67.

  144. 144.

    Locke (2003), op.cit. Chapter XIV, para 160. For Locke, executive power, all political power is based on trust and consent, rather than continuous democratic approval for each and every governmental action. It is only if there is an egregious breach of trust that people have a duty to revolt. See Hampshire-Monk (1992), pp. 104–108.

  145. 145.

    Finnis (2008), p. 11.

  146. 146.

    ibid 14.

  147. 147.

    ibid 4.

  148. 148.

    On the concept of polycentricity, see Fuller (1978), p. 353.

  149. 149.

    Finnis (2008), p. 16.

  150. 150.

    See, for instance, Lord Irvine (1996), p. 63; Lord Sumption (2011).

  151. 151.

    Harlow and Rawlings’s helpful metaphor of red and green light review is helpful here. See Harlow and Rawlings (2009), chapter 1.

  152. 152.

    See Endicott (2016).

  153. 153.

    See, for instance, Tomkins (2005), chapter 4.

  154. 154.

    For a stark contrast between positivist and anti-positivist approaches of statutory interpretation, compare Ekins (2012) and a review of that book in Kyritsis (2015a), pp. 164–175.

  155. 155.

    See Allen (2009), pp. 119–128 and 125.

  156. 156.

    Bancoult (HL) [52] (Lord Hoffmann).

  157. 157.

    See Poole (2010), p. 91.

  158. 158.

    E.g. the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010.

  159. 159.

    For an overview of this trend see, for example, Elliott (2015).

  160. 160.

    R. (on the application of Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2017] UKSC 5; [2017] 2 W.L.R. 583 (SC), [80]–[81].

  161. 161.

    HRA s 21(1) paragraph f(i) includes Orders in Council within the definition of primary legislation.

  162. 162.

    Miller op. cit. [92]–[94].

  163. 163.

    The Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 leaves many key prerogative powers untouched, for instance, the power to deploy the armed forces.

  164. 164.

    Section 1 of the CLVA includes Orders in Council within the definition of colonial law. This was crucial for the House of Lords. See Bancoult (HL) [97] (Lord Rodger) and for Finnis. See Finnis(2008), p. 4. Cf. Bancoult (CA) [26] (Sedley LJ), ruling that Orders in Council were merely ‘included by the parliamentary draftsman ...for completeness, since they too were a source of colonial law’.

  165. 165.

    See, for example, GCHQ above (n 48), R (Abbasi) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, [2002] EWCA Civ 1598, R (Al-Rawi) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, [2006] EWCA Civ 1279, R v Secretary of State for the Home Department, ex party Bentley [1994] Q.B. 349 DC. For criticism of the judicial role in these cases, see Poole (2010), pp. 103–104. See further, Elliott and Perreau-Saussine (2009), p. 717.

  166. 166.

    See Cohn (2009), pp. 272–274 criticising decisions such as Laker Airways [1977] 1 Q.B. 643 CA (Civ Div) and Northumbria Police Authority above (n 122) that, in her view, ‘dodge’ the residuality principle set out in De Keyser’s Royal Hotel Ltd [1920] A.C. 508 HL at 528. Cohn falls into the positivist trap here of assuming that judges were avoiding the clear legal rules. For Justice Hercules the judges in these cases made a moral judgment that something like the ‘moral-difference’ scheme of principle gave the best account of the case law and constitutional practice as a whole.

  167. 167.

    For the ongoing tension between these types of values, see Sales (2015).

  168. 168.

    These are among the key questions that animate anti-positivist debates about law. This is not the occasion to attempt any contribution to these debates. For a sophisticated attempt to reject the first form of objection to Hercules’ reasoning and support the second, see Allan (2016a), p. 705; Allan (2016b), pp. 58–82.

  169. 169.

    See the footnotes accompanying the two moral schemes above.

  170. 170.

    See Dworkin (1986b), chapter 6, Kyritsis (2015b), chapter 4–6.

  171. 171.

    Kyritsis (2015b), p. 69.

  172. 172.

    ibid.

  173. 173.

    Postema (1997), pp. 821–855.

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  1. University of Reading, Reading, UK

    Stuart Lakin

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    Chris Monaghan

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Lakin, S. (2018). Justifying Bancoult (No 2): Why Justice Hercules Must Sometimes Disappoint Us. In: Allen, S., Monaghan, C. (eds) Fifty Years of the British Indian Ocean Territory. The World of Small States, vol 4. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78541-7_2

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