Director General of Fair Trading v Proprietary Association of Great Britain, [2001] EWCA Civ 1217
Citation:Director General of Fair Trading v Proprietary Association of Great Britain, [2001] EWCA Civ 1217
Rule of thumb:Can an association argue that their human rights have been violated? No, it is only people, partnerships and companies who can argue this, but not associations.
Judgment:
The Court held that associations cannot bring human rights actions as ‘victims’. They can bring administrative law actions because in this case their right to a fair trial was not followed, but they cannot bring human rights actions in concurrence with these because associations are representative of their members and not deemed to be persons in themselves, ‘Mr Philip Sales has appeared for the Lord Chancellor to resist this claim. He takes two preliminary points. If they are good points, there will be no need for us to consider any of the other matters that were debated before us. His first point is that PAGB is not a victim within the meaning of section 7(1) of the 1998 Act (see also section 7(7)) so that the court has no jurisdiction to grant them any relief under the Act. This in itself would not be sufficient to bar PATA's claim under that section. Mr Sales's second point is that these proceedings are completely misconceived. This court has corrected the situation that arose at first instance, so that an impartial tribunal was made available for the determination of the civil rights in issue. The appellants are therefore quite unable to claim that any Article 6 rights have been infringed. Mr Sales's first point was developed along the following lines. Article 6(1) provides, so far as is material, that: "In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law." This language has been held to mean that a complainant must be able to show that his own civil rights and obligations have been directly affected by the proceedings and be the subject-matter of the dispute’, Lord Justice Brook
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