Jersey Unreported Judgments

Employment - leave to apply for judicial review.

[2023]JRC116

Royal Court

(Samedi)

11 July 2023

Before     :

Sir Timothy Le Cocq, Bailiff

 

Advocate M. P. Boothman for the Applicant.

Advocate J. P. Rondel for the Respondent.

judgment

the bailiff:

1.        This is an application by Lindsey Gina Greechan ("the Applicant") for leave to apply for judicial review against the States Employment Board ("the Respondent") for a decision of 18 November 2022 refusing to quash the decision of the Respondent's officials to dismiss the Applicant on 24 May 2022, the effect of which was the Applicant's dismissal from employment.  The relief sought is the quashing of the decision dismissing the Applicant and accordingly her reinstatement.

Background

2.        The background is set out in the Applicant's affidavit of 18 February 2023.  In brief, the Applicant was employed by First Recruitment Limited ("FRL") between December 2021 and April 2022.  FRL was contracted by the Government of Jersey to provide telephone assistance to the public of Jersey on the Covid Helpline.

3.        Pursuant to that contract, the Applicant was given access to a computer database and was authorised access to that database to, amongst other things, book Covid PCR tests, arrange vaccination appointments, and place orders for Lateral Flow testing kits.

4.        The computer database contained information, which the Applicant was able to access, regarding individuals who were registered with the Social Security department to verify personal details and to undertake the tasks that the Applicant was required to do.

5.        The Applicant remained in her role with FRL until April 2022 and thereafter, on 3 May 2022, she commenced employment with the States Treasury as an adviser.  In that context, she was employed by the Respondent in accordance with the Employment of States of Jersey Employees (Jersey) Law 2005 ("the 2005 Law").

6.        On Friday 20 May 2022, however, the Applicant was informed that she was under investigation and was required immediately to leave the building.

7.        On 23 May 2022 she was called into the building to discuss:

"concerns which have been brought to our attention and to advise you of the proposed course of action"

8.        The meeting took place as scheduled on 24 May 2022.  At that meeting, the Applicant was told that a concern had arisen from information received that the Applicant had accessed information on the computer database which was inappropriate for her to see.  She had apparently accessed her own data records and those of members of her family and she was informed that she should have known from her training that this was not permitted.

9.        During the course of the interview, the Applicant explained that her training had not made the situation clear.  She subsequently established, according to her affidavit, that the induction course that she had supposedly completed - which in fact she had not - stated that it was not acceptable to look up friends' records "just out of interest".  She denies, however, that she ever did that and she only accessed other people's data in order to do her job of helping callers on the Helpline.

10.      In paragraph 5 of her affidavit, the Applicant says that her meeting was brief and before she had the opportunity to say anything, she was told that the decision had been made to terminate her employment with immediate effect.  She had admitted accessing her family's data records and in a letter of the same day, she was told that doing so was regarded as gross misconduct and therefore her contract would be terminated with immediate effect.

11.      She did not have the opportunity, so she claims, to explain that the training she actually did receive, and any mistakes or otherwise that she had made, were not done whilst employed by the Government of Jersey but rather by FRL and that any breach of policy was entirely unintentional.  The lack of notice of what the meeting was to deal with and the short duration of it made it impossible for her to defend herself.

12.      In the letter of 24 May 2022, she was advised of her ability to appeal and she wrote to the Group Director, People and Corporate Services on behalf of the Respondent the following day.  The Group Director responded on 20 June 2022 confirming he had had the opportunity to review the case which included the points that she had made and a desk-top review of the case, and had concluded that the decision to dismiss was the correct one.

13.      The Applicant thereafter pursued the Respondent in the Employment and Discrimination Tribunal in relation to certain ancillary matters but she could not make a claim against the Respondent for unfair dismissal because she had not been employed for the requisite 26 weeks.  Accordingly, a settlement agreement that she reached was concluded with the Respondent over matters unrelated to the fact of her dismissal.

14.      The Applicant secured political representation to raise the matter with the Board of the Respondent and the Applicant understands the matter was considered by the Board on 18 November 2022 but by letter from the Chief Executive of the Government of Jersey of 14 December 2022, the Applicant was informed that the appeal decision had been considered and upheld.

15.      It is in that context that the Applicant seeks judicial review of the decision to dismiss her and the refusal of the Respondent to review that decision on the 24 May 2022 and around 18 November 2022 respectively.

The legal framework

16.      Rule 16/1 of the Royal Court Rules 2004 (as amended) ("RCR") provides as follows:

"16/1 Application and interpretation

(1) Except in cases where an appeal is available against a decision of a public authority or body, and subject to paragraph (3), an application for a declaration, injunction or any other order in any public law matter must be brought by way of an application for judicial review made in accordance with this Part unless the Court otherwise orders.

(2) For the purposes of this Part, an application is made in a public law matter if the application relates to the validity of a judgment, decision, order or other action of a public authority or body, or seeks relief to compel a public authority or body to perform a duty owed by it in public law or seeks to restrain it from acting in a way that would be invalid.

(3) In determining whether an application falls within paragraph (1), the Bailiff or Court shall have regard to -

(a) the nature of the matters in respect of which relief is sought;

(b) the nature of the persons and bodies against whom relief is being sought; and

(c) all the circumstances of the case."

17.      The Applicant submits that the Respondent is a public body established under the 2005 Law and the decisions that are the subject of the application were taken contrary to the duties owed by the Respondent under that Law.  The Applicant cites Article 8 of the 2005 Law which is in the following terms:

"8 Functions of States Employment Board

(1) The States Employment Board shall -

(a) employ persons on behalf of the States and administrations of the States;

(b) ensure that the public service conducts itself with economy, efficiency, probity and effectiveness;

(c) ensure the health, safety and well-being of States' employees;

(d) determine any other matter that may reasonably be considered necessary for the proper administration and management of States' employees; and

(e) discharge any other function conferred on it by or under any enactment.

(2) The States Employment Board shall, for the purpose of the discharge of the functions described in paragraph (1)(a) to (c) -

(a) give directions regarding consultation or negotiation with States' employees, or with representatives of States' employees, concerning the terms and conditions of employment of States' employees;

(b) issue codes of practice concerning -

(i) the training and development needs of States' employees,

(ii) the procedures for recruitment of States' employees,

(iii) the procedures for appraisal of the performance of States' employees,

(iv) the procedures for disciplining, suspending and terminating the employment of States' employees; ..."

The Law on leave

18.      The test to be applied by the Court in respect of applications for leave for judicial review is set out in a number of judgments and, most recently, in WE (Jersey) Limited v Minister for the Environment [2022] JRC 044, as that set out by Commissioner Beloff in Warren v Lieutenant-Governor [2017] (1) JLR 291 which is in the following terms:

"3. The test for such leave in this jurisdiction, as applied in Welsh -v- Deputy Judicial Greffier (7), is that set out by the Privy Council in Sharma -v- Browne-Antoine (6) [2007] 1 WLR 780, at para 14(4):

"The ordinary rule now is that the court will refuse leave to claim judicial review unless satisfied and there is an arguable ground for judicial review having a realistic prospect of success and not subject to a discretionary bar such as delay or an alternative remedy: see R -v- Legal Aid Board, Ex p Hughes (1992) 5 Admin LR 623, 628 and Fordham, Judicial Review Handbook 4th ed (2004), p426. But arguability cannot be judged without reference to the nature and gravity of the issued to be argued. It is a test which is flexible in its application."

4. For an application for judicial review to succeed, the Royal Court would have to be satisfied that His Excellency's decision was unlawful, irrational or flawed by procedural impropriety (Planning & Environment Cttee. -v- Lesquende Ltd. (4)) and for present purposes I must be satisfied that one or more of those grounds is arguably established on the material before me."

19.      In Sharma, cited above, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council also stated:

"It is not enough that a case is potentially arguable: an applicant cannot plead potential arguability to "justify the grant of leave to issue proceedings upon a speculative basis which it is hoped the interlocutory processes of the court may strengthen": Matalulu v Director of Public Prosecutions [2003] 4 LRC712, 733."

Relevant authorities

20.      A number of cases were put before me.  The first was Regina v East Berkshire Health Authority, Ex parte Walsh [1985] QB 152.  In that case, a senior nursing officer applied for judicial review to quash his dismissal on the grounds that individual who dismissed him had no powers to do so and on the grounds of procedural impropriety.  The Court of Appeal of England and Wales found that the remedy of judicial review was only available where an issue of 'public law' was involved. Sir John Donaldson M.R. found the following:

"Employment by a public authority does not per se inject any element of public law. Nor does the fact that the employee is in a "higher grade" or is an "officer." This only makes it more likely that there will be special statutory restrictions upon dismissal, or other underpinning of his employment: see per Lord Reid in Malloch v. Aberdeen Corporation, at p. 1582. It will be this underpinning and not the seniority which injects the element of public law. Still less can I find any warrant for equating public law with the interest of the public. If the public through Parliament gives effect to that interest by means of statutory provisions, that is quite different, but the interest of the public per se is not sufficient".

In turn, LJ Purchase stated:

"... At the end of the day I find myself returning to the basic question, did the remedies sought by the applicant arise solely out of a private right in contract between him and the authority or upon some breach of the public duty placed upon that authority which related to the exercise of the powers granted by statute to them to engage and dismiss him in the course of providing a national service to the public? In my judgment there is no arguable case which can be mounted upon the facts disclosed even if they are all assumed in favour of the applicant to the effect that the remedies sought by him stem from a breach which can be related to any right arising out of the public rights and duties enjoyed by, or imposed upon the health authority. The only remedies sought by the applicant arise solely out of his contract of employment with them as opposed to any public duty imposed upon the health authority".

21.      In Regina (Shoesmith) v Ofsted and Others [2011] PTSR 1459 the Claimant was employed as a local authority's Director of Children's Services ("DCS"), which was a statutory post introduced by the Children Act 2004. Following the death of a child which was under the authority's child protection plan, a review report was produced in short order, leading to the summary dismissal of the Claimant on the basis of the Secretary of State's direction and without compensation or payment in lieu of notice. The Claimant issued judicial review proceedings against the decision to dismiss her. The Court found at paragraph 91:

"I have emphasised the word "accountability" and shall have to return to it. It is obvious from the words of the statute and of the guidance that a DCS is the person within a children's services authority with ultimate executive responsibility and accountability for children's services. It is a position created, required and defined by and under statute. It falls comfortably within the circumstances referred to in Ridge v Baldwin [1964] AC 40. Moreover, it seems to me that if one focuses on "statutory Underpinning" in accordance with Ex p Walsh [1985] QB 152, one is driven to the same conclusion. Stepping aside from the details of the present case and the multiplicity of parties, if a local authority were to dismiss a DCS in total disregard for the rules of natural justice, I am in no doubt that, whatever alternative remedy might be available in the employment tribunal, the dismissal would be amenable to judicial review. Miss Simler suggests that such an analysis only arises when the power to dismiss is itself circumscribed by statutory provision. I disagree. Indeed in Ridge v Baldwin itself the application succeeded not only by reference to regulations made pursuant to statute but also on the basis of a common law requirement of natural justice: see Lord Reid, at pp 79-80; Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest, at p 121; and Lord Hodson, at pp 127 and 135. I consider that the judge was correct on the issue of amenability".

22.      The Applicant refers to the limits imposed by the Employment (Jersey) Law 2003 (the "Employment Law") in relation to claims for unfair dismissal, however, as observed by Deputy Bailiff Birt, as he then was, in Ralph George McDonald v Parish of St Helier [2005] JRC 074:

"...the States have occupied the field. They have passed legislation in the knowledge of what the established customary law provides. As with the English legislation, the States have chosen not to provide simply for a statutory implied term against unfair dismissal, leaving the courts to award damages on the usual contractual basis. They have, as in England, decided to remove jurisdiction in such cases to a specialist tribunal, to provide very short time limits, to provide a mechanism for limiting the amount of compensation and to provide that certain employees should be excluded from any remedy."

23.      The Judicial Review Handbook (Sixth Edition) by Michael Fordham QC was put before me.  This contained an extensive discussion on the distinction between remedies in public law and private law and their applicability in judicial review in general.  Under the heading relating to employment disputes at paragraph 34.5.4 under decisions which have been held by the courts to be non-reviewable, the following is to be found:

"34.5.4 Employment

(A) NON-REVIEWABLE.  R v BBC, ex p Lavelle [1983] 1 WLR 23, 30 C (Woolf J: "An application for judicial review has not and should not be extended to a pure employment situation"): McClaren v Home Office [1990] ICR 824, 836B-838B: Wandsworth London Borough Council v A [2000] 1 WLR 1246, 1252G-H ("in the case of employment by a public body, that legal status of the employer does not per se inject any element of public law"); R (Evans) v University of Cambridge [2002] EWHC 1382 (Admin) [2003] ELR 8 (despite University's public functions and statutory underpinning, claimant lecturer's remedies for employment matters statutory or contractual). [23] ("essentially an employment or contractual dispute"); R v East Berkshire Health Authority, ex p Walsh [1985] QB 152 (decision to dismiss nursing officer not reviewable); R v Secretary of State for Employment, ex p Equal Opportunities Commission [1995] 1 AC 1, 25C-E (individual employee's claim a matter for the employment tribunal); R v Secretary of State for the Home Department, ex p Moore [1994] COD 67 (confirmation of the decision to dismiss a prison officer); R v Trent Regional Health Authority ex p Jones The Times 19th June 1986 (decision refusing to appoint a consultant surgeon); R v Derbyshire County Council, ex p Noble [1990] ICR 808 (council dismissal of deputy police surgeon); R v Lord Chancellor's Department, ex p Nangle [1992] 1 All ER 897 (disciplinary decisions affecting civil servant working for Lord Chancellor's Department); R v Crown Prosecution Service, ex P Hogg (1994) 6 Admin LR 778 (dismissal of barrister employed by the CPS); R (Arthurworry) v Haringey London Borough Council [2001] EWHC Admin 698 (disciplinary proceedings not reviewable, but court granting a remedy by reference to the implied duty of trust and confidence between employer and employee); R (Tucker) v Director General of the National Crime Squad [2003] EWCA Civ 2 at [35] ("clear line between disciplinary issues where an officer has the right to public law safeguards such as fairness, and operational or management decisions where the police are entitled to run their own affairs without the interventions of the courts"); Manning v Ramjohn [2011] UKPC 20 at [34] (doubting Tucker)."

24.      Under the following paragraph dealing with reviewable decisions, these in general tended to relate to public office holders:

"27.3.7 Avoid arid and costly procedural debate.  Clark v University of Lincolnshire and Humberside [2000] 1 WLR 1988 at [37] (Lord Woolf MR: "The intention of the CPR is to harmonise procedures as far as possible and to avoid barren procedural disputes which generate satellite litigation") R (Heather) v Leonard Cheshire Foundation [2002] EWCA Civ 366 [2002] 2 All ER 936 at [38] (referring to "the old demarcation disputes as to when judicial review was or was not appropriate under Order 53.  Part 54 CPR is intended to avoid any such disputes which are wholly unproductive"); R v Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food, ex p Lower Burytown Farms Ltd [1999] EuLR 129, 127F-138A (tensions in the law, now resolved by Rye).

27.3.8 Be flexible and permissive.  Mercury Communications Ltd v Director General of Telecommunications [1996] 1 WLR 48, 57D-E (Lord Slynn: "some flexibility as to the use of different procedures is necessary.  It has to be borne in mind that the overriding question is whether the proceedings constitute an abuse of the process of the court"): British Steel Plc v Commissioners for Customs & Excise [1997] 2 All ER 366 (Saville LJ: "In this day and age it is surely possible to devise procedures which avoid this form of satellite litigation, while safeguarding both the private rights of individuals and companies and the position and responsibilities of public authorities"); Roy v Kensington & Chelsea & Westminster Family Practitioner Committee [1992] 1 AC 624, 655A (Lord Lowry: "unless the procedure adopted by the moving party is ill suited to dispose of the question at issue, there is much to be said in favour of the proposition that a court having jurisdiction ought to let a case be heard rather than entertain a debate concerning the form of the proceedings"); R (Heather) v Leonard Cheshire Foundation [2002] EWCA Civ 366 [2002] 2 All ER 936 at [38] (since a "bona fide contention is being advanced (although incorrect) that LCF was performing a public function, that is an appropriate issue to be brought to the court by way of judicial review"), [39] ("We wish to make clear that the CPR provides a framework which is sufficiently flexible to enable all the issues between the parties to be determined...In view of the possibility of a misunderstanding as to the scope of judicial review we draw attention to this and the powers of transfer under Part 54"); Phonographic Performance Ltd v Department of Trade and Industry [2004] EWHC 1795 (Ch) (not an abuse of process to bring Francovich reparation claim for non-implementation of EU Directive by ordinary claim form action), [49] ("essentially private law proceedings which can and prima facie should be brought by an ordinary claim"); D v Home Office [2005] EWCA Civ 38 [2006] 1 WLR 1003 at [105] (false imprisonment damages could be claimed in the county court and did not need to be by judicial review only); R (Garbet) v Circle 33 Housing Trust [2009] EWHC 3153 (Admin) at [89] (where breach of duty to consult sheltered accommodation resident, arising from tenancy agreement, Court granting the declaration that would have been granted in private proceedings; not necessary therefore to consider further whether "public law claim" or "private law claim").

27.3.9 Onus on the objector.  Davy v Spelthorne Borough Council [1984] AC 262, 278F (Lord Wilberforce: "prima facie the rule applies that the plaintiff may choose the court and the procedure which suits him best.  The onus lies upon the defendant to show that in doing so he is abusing the court's procedure"); R v East Berkshire Health Authority, ex p Walsh [1985] QB 152, 173G ("A party inviting the court to take this draconian step assumes a heavy burden")."

25.      In Evans v University of Cambridge [2002] EWHC 1382 (Admin), the court at paragraph 10 of the judgment said:

"The demarcation between public law disputes which the Administrative Court will entertain and private law disputes which it will not is not always capable of precise definition.  The question to be asked in the present case is whether the decision-makers were exercising public law or private law functions.  In this regard, the prime focus is not so much on the status and nature of the body making the decision as to the particular function that it is exercising.  Where that function relates to employment, cases that have come before the courts have usually fallen on the private law side of the line for the no doubt obvious reason that there are other remedies of a statutory or contractual nature."

26.      That judgment went on to cite McLaren v The Home Office [1990] IRLR 338 wherein the Court of Appeal, Woolf LJ said:

"2.  There can, however, be situations where an employee of a public body can seek judicial review and obtain a remedy which would not be available to an employee in the private sector.  This will arise where there exists some disciplinary or other body established under the prerogative or by statute to which the employer or the employee is entitled to require to refer disputes affecting their relationship.  The procedure of judicial review can then be appropriate because it has always been part of the role of the court in public law proceedings to supervise inferior tribunals and the court in reviewing disciplinary proceedings is performing a similar role.  As long as the 'tribunal' or other body has a sufficient public law element, which it almost invariably will have if the employer is the Crown and it is not domestic or wholly informal its proceedings and determination can be an appropriate subject for judicial review...

3.  In addition if an employee of the Crown or other public body is adversely affected by a decision of general application by his employer, but he contends that the decision is flawed on what I loosely describe as Wednesbury grounds, he can be entitled to challenge that decision by way of judicial review..."

27.      In R (Tucker) v Director General of the National Crime Squad [2003] EWCA Civ 57, the Court of Appeal held:

"Is the decision amenable to judicial review?

12 If the decision to end the applicant's secondment is not amenable to judicial review, that is the end of the matter. He has no remedy. Questions of fairness do not arise. Harrison J however concluded that judicial review is available but went on to reject the applicant's case on fairness. The judge's conclusion that judicial review is available is challenged in a respondent's notice and it is convenient to deal with this issue first.

13 The boundary between public law and private law is not capable of precise definition, and whether a decision has a sufficient public law element to justify the intervention of the Administrative Court by judicial review is often as much a matter of feel, as deciding whether any particular criteria are met. There are some cases that fall at or near the boundary where the court rather than saying the claim is not amenable to judicial review has expressed a reluctance to intervene in the absence of very exceptional circumstances: see, e g R v British Broadcasting Corpn, Ex p Lavelle [1983] ICR 99.

14 The starting point, as it seems to me, is that there is no single test or criterion by which the question can be determined. Woolf LJ said in R v Derbyshire County Council, Ex p Noble [1990] ICR 808, 814:

"Unfortunately in my view there is no universal test which will be applicable to all circumstances which will indicate clearly and beyond peradventure as to when judicial review is or is not available. It is a situation where the courts have, over the years, by decisions in individual cases, indicated the approximate divide between those cases which are appropriate to be dealt with by judicial review and those cases which are suitably dealt with in ordinary civil proceedings."

15 Sir John Donaldson MR in R v Panel on Take-overs and Mergers, Ex p Datafin plc [1987] QB 815, 838 having referred to a number of different situations in which the court had asserted its jurisdiction, said:

"In all the reports it is possible to find enumerations of factors giving rise to the jurisdiction, but it is a fatal error to regard the presence of all those factors as essential or as being exclusive of other factors. Possibly the only essential elements are what can be described as a public element, which can take many different forms, and the exclusion from the jurisdiction of bodies whose sole source of power is a consensual submission to its jurisdiction."

16 What are the crucial factors in the present case? In Leech v Deputy Governor of Parkhurst Prison [1988] AC 533 Lord Oliver of Aylmerton said that the susceptibility of a decision to the supervision of the courts must depend, in the ultimate analysis, upon the nature and consequences of the decision and not upon the personality or individual circumstances of the person called on to make the decision. I regard this as a particularly important matter to keep in mind in the present case."

28.      And then that Court later in the judgment went on to say:

"24 In R (Hopley) v Liverpool Health Authority [2002] EWHC 1723 (Admin) Pitchford J helpfully set out three things that had to be identified when considering whether a public body with statutory powers was exercising a public function amenable to judicial review or a private function that was not. These are: (i) whether the defendant was a public body exercising statutory powers; (ii) whether the function being performed in the exercise of those powers was a public or a private one; and (iii) whether the defendant was performing a public duty owed to the claimant in the particular circumstances under consideration. That was a case where the Liverpool Health Authority had refused to consent to payment to the claimant of damages for personal injury by periodical payments under a with profits structured settlement made under section 2 of the Damages Act 1996. He concluded that the decision was not amenable to judicial review because the function being performed by the health authority, as it affected the claimant, was a private one.

25 Applying those criteria, with which I agree, to the present case it seems to me clear that the third criterion was not met. The deputy director general in sending the applicant back to his force was not performing a public duty owed to him. The decision taken in relation to the applicant was specific to him. Other officers were dealt with differently. Some were arrested; some were sent back to be disciplined; one was retained with different duties. But the applicant was simply sent back. It was a decision tailor-made to him. It was taken because of perceived deficiencies in his skills and conduct as an national crime squad officer. It was an operational decision taken because it was decided that he fell short of the particular requirements that were necessary to work in the national crime squad. It had nothing to do with his private life and I reject Mr Westgate's contention that article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights was engaged."

29.      I have not set out all of the authorities placed before me as I am only considering at this point whether the Applicant has crossed the threshold to be entitled to bring a full judicial review application.

30.      This is an employment law matter and it arises out of a contract of employment between the Applicant and the Respondent.  The Applicant is not an office holder.

31.      Taken at face value, as indeed I must in the instant application because there is no contrary evidence before me, it appears that the initial decision not to continue the Applicant's employment was taken at the end of an unfair and truncated procedure in which the Applicant was afforded no opportunity to prepare for the allegations to be made against her, nor to explain her position.

32.      Furthermore, again, it appears on the surface of the information before me, that in reviewing the dismissal of the Applicant it would have been difficult for the Respondent to conclude that the Applicant's employment had been discontinued as a result of a proper and fair process.

33.      Naturally, as I have indicated above, these are merely tentative observations based on my understanding of one side of the factual contentions and without having heard the other side.  The Respondent resists grant of leave on the narrow but important point that this is simply not a public law matter but rather is a matter of private employment or, alternatively, that the Respondent has an alternate remedy.

34.      I accept that the question of the jurisdiction of this Court on judicial review in employment matters has been substantially canvassed by reference to authority as set out above.  It is apparent from a review of that authority that it is not always easy to determine on which side of the line a particular application falls.  In this case, the following seem to me to be relevant considerations:

(i)        This is undoubtedly an employment matter in the sense that it deals with the termination of the employment of an individual employed by the Respondent;

(ii)       The Applicant is not an office holder;

(iii)      The Applicant does not have an alternative remedy for unfair dismissal by reason of the statutory restrictions imposed under the Employment Law as she had not been employed for the statutory period;

(iv)      Prima facie, and subject to the qualifications I have set out above, the process of dismissing the Applicant was arguably unfair.

(v)       The Respondent is a public body.

35.      The fact that the Respondent is a public law body does not make this a public law case.  Had the Respondent not been a public law body and the actions complained of been taken by a private company, for example, there would have been no question of a judicial review.

36.      In my judgment, there are not sufficient features in this case or a sufficient public law element such as the Court should assume jurisdiction to conduct a judicial review.  No matter how the Respondent has behaved towards the Applicant, the relationship between them does not possess the public law element which is essential to justify an application for judicial review.

37.      In the circumstances, on that point I refuse the Applicant's application for leave.

Authorities

Employment of States of Jersey Employees (Jersey) Law 2005. 

Royal Court Rules 2004 (as amended). 

WE (Jersey) Limited v Minister for the Environment [2022] JRC 044. 

Warren v Lieutenant-Governor [2017] (1) JLR 291. 

Regina v East Berkshire Health Authority, Ex parte Walsh [1985] QB 152

Regina (Shoesmith) v Ofsted and Others [2011] PTSR 1459.  

Employment (Jersey) Law 2003. 

Ralph George McDonald v Parish of St Helier [2005] JRC 074. 

The Judicial Review Handbook (Sixth Edition) by Michael Fordham QC. 

Evans v University of Cambridge [2002] EWHC 1382 (Admin). 

McLaren v The Home Office [1990] IRLR 338. 

R (Tucker) v Director General of the National Crime Squad [2003] EWCA Civ 57.