The Court held that the ouster clause in the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, s 67(8) has the effect of preventing a judicial review claim being brought against the IPT. The IPT regime established by the 2000 Act was such that it enabled claims against the intelligence services to be determined on the basis of full evidence about their activities, whilst also ensuring that sensitive confidential information about those activities would not be disclosed. Were judicial review proceedings permitted they would in effect bypass the special procedural regime established for the IPT and this could not be the correct interpretation of the effect of s 67(8). The Court of Appeal agreed with the obiter dictum of Lord Brown in R (A) v Director of Establishments of the Security Service [2009] EWCA Civ 24 and [2009] UKSC 12; [2010] 2 AC 1 that unlike the ouster clause in Anisminic, the provision in s 67(8) of the 2000 Act was “an unambiguous ouster”.
Jonathan Glasson QC was involved in this case.