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The ICLR website has put up what appear to the be the final 13 permission decisions from 2009.  These decisions were given on 16, 18, 21 and 22 December 2009.  Permission was granted in 4 cases and refused in 9 others. 

None of the four cases in which permission was given are criminal cases and none involve human rights or “constitutional” issues.  Perhaps the most newsworthy case in which permission was granted is Bocardo SA v Star Energy UK Onshore Ltd [2009] EWCA Civ 579; ([2009] 3 WLR 1010) which concerns the rights to drill for oil under a property owned by the family of Mr Mohammed Al-Fayed in Surrey.  The case was extensively covered at the time of the Court of Appeal decision, see for example, the Independent. and the Property Law Blog. Peter Smith J awarded the claimant 9% of the £6.9 milion earned from the oil field and the same percentage of future income but the Court of Appeal reduced the award to £1,000 for past and future trespass. 

Permission was also granted in Autoclenz v Belcher [2009] EWCA Civ 1046  which concerns the question as to whether an individual was an employee, a “worker” or a self-employed contractor, in R (Coke-Wallis) v Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales [2009] EWCA Civ 730  which deals with the question as to whether two disciplinary complaints against a chartered accountant were the same or substantially the same and in Dallah Real Estate and Tourism Holding Co v Ministry of Religious Affairs, Government of Pakistan [2009] EWCA Civ 755 which concerns the enforcement of an arbitration award under the New York Convention.

The nine cases in which permission was refused were as are follows:

  • R (Downs) v Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [2009] EWCA Civ 664 – the case brought the the pesticide campaigner, Georgina Downs who has no vowed to “take her case to Europe”
  • Bradford and Bingley plc v Cutler [2008] EWCA Civ 74 – mortgage payments by the Benefits Agency were made on behalf of the borrower and could revive a claim which was otherwise barred for limitation.
  • Pablo Star Ltd v Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co PJSC [2009] EWCA Civ 1044– case concerning the grant of permission to serve proceedings outside the jurisdiction
  • R (S) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2009] EWCA Civ 142  – a case concerning the failure to apply an immigration policy, the actions of the Secretary of State had not been conspicuously unfair
  • HR (Portugal) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2009] EWCA Civ 371 – a European Economic Area national who, having been convicted of a crime, was detained for a significant period in prison was not resident in the UK for that period for the purposes of Directive 2004/38 art.28(3) or the Immigration (European Economic Area) Regulations 2006 reg.21(4)(a).
  • Mansel Oil Ltd v Troon Storage Tankers SA (The Ailsa Craig) [2009] EWCA Civ 425; [2009] 2 Lloyd’s Rep 371  – charterers’ nomination of a delivery port was not a condition precedent to the right to cancel.
  • R (Bary) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2009] EWHC 2068 (Admin) – the xtradition to the United States of America of two men suspected of involvement with terrorist activities did not constitute a breach of either man’s rights under the European Convention on Human Rights 1950 art.3 in respect of the likely conditions of their detention in prison pending trial and post conviction in the US.
  • R (Shashwar) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2008] EWHC 2069 (Admin) – Secretary of State not entitled to put a gloss on a policy relating to Iraqi asylum seekers.
  • R v Fulton [2009] NICA 39– in which the Northern Ireland Court of Appeal had dismissed the conviction of a loyalist murderer, described by the judges as a “ruthless and vicious individual”, see the BBC report of the decision.