Hare, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department & Anor

Where the Secretary of State exercises the power to recall a licensee because recall is considered expedient in the public interest, he is not ordinarily required to verify the accuracy of information supplied by the Probation Service before acting on it. A challenge will succeed only on an established public-law ground. Judicial review of such a decision is particularly difficult because the Parole Board provides an additional review mechanism and is better placed to assess the balance between public risk and the prisoner’s interests.

The claimant challenged two decisions concerning his release licence: the Secretary of State’s decision on 29 May 2003 to recall him to custody, and the Parole Board’s subsequent decision confirming revocation of the licence.

The defendants conceded that the Parole Board’s decision should be quashed and undertook to reconsider the matter urgently. The claimant nevertheless pursued the challenge to the Secretary of State’s decision, alleging that it had been based on inaccurate information in a probation report, including an assertion that he had been charged when he had only been arrested.

1. The Parole Board decision. The decision of 16 July 2003 was quashed by consent because the Board had not acted in accordance with the law. The Board undertook to reconsider the matter urgently and by no later than Thursday of that week.
2. The Secretary of State’s decision. The challenge to the recall decision under section 39(2) of the Criminal Justice Act 1991 failed. The Secretary of State was entitled to act on the information supplied in the probation report. The court rejected the premise that he was required, before exercising the recall power, to investigate whether that information was accurate.
3. The decision was not arguably unreasonable on the information before the Secretary of State. There was therefore no legal ground for interfering with it by judicial review.
4. Following the approach noted in Biggs [2002] EWHC 1012 (Admin), the court would be very reluctant to interfere with the Secretary of State’s discretion. The Parole Board was better placed than the court to assess the balance between the risk to the public and the prisoner’s interests.
5. The application was refused so far as it challenged the Secretary of State’s decision. The claimant obtained his costs in relation to the quashed Parole Board decision, subject to detailed assessment if not agreed.

First-instance judicial review proceedings. The judgment records that permission had previously been granted by Forbes J.