Lister v Forth Dry Dock Co Ltd, 1989 SLT 540 (HL)

Citation:Lister v Forth Dry Dock Co Ltd, 1989 SLT 540 (HL)

Rule of thumb:If an Act or Regulation has been passed off the back of a ratified Treaty or an EU directive, should the ratified treaty or EU Directive be taken into account? Yes, this is a supplementary help to interpreting the Act or Regulation.

Judgment:

Where an Act or Regulation has been introduced off the back of an EU Directive, the Court should consider this EU Directive when interpreting the statute or Regulation before them. They are also supposed to consider if there has been any Judgments on this from the European Court of Justice, and if so, take these into account.

Ratio-decidendi:

‘It follows that in applying national law and in particular provisions of the national law specifically introduced in order to implement Directive 76/207, national Courts are required to interpret their national law in light of the wording and the purpose of the directive in order to achieve the result referred to in the third paragraph marked 189. Thus the Courts of the United Kingdom are under a duty to follow the practice of the European Court of Justice by giving a purposive construction to directive and to regulations issued for the purpose of complying with directives’, Lord Templeman

Warning: This is not professional legal advice. This is not professional legal education advice. Please obtain professional guidance before embarking on any legal course of action. This is just an interpretation of a Judgment by persons of legal insight & varying levels of legal specialism, experience & expertise. Please read the Judgment yourself and form your own interpretation of it with professional assistance.