Legal campaign group Good Law Project does not have standing to challenge the appointments of senior government officials on the grounds of breach of the public sector equality duty, the High Court ruled today in a significant decision on the ability of such groups to bring judicial reviews.

However two judges found that Baroness (Dido) Harding was appointed as interim chair of the National Institute for Health Protection in August 2020 without compliance with the public sector equality duty (PSED). The court also held that a decision to appoint Mike Coupe as director of testing at NHS Test and Trace the following month was in breach of the PSED.

The Good Law Project and equality thinktank the Runnymede Trust brought a judicial review last year over the appointments, arguing the government had a policy of choosing ‘only candidates with some relevant personal or political connection to the decision-maker’ to carry out important, but unpaid, roles.

But the High Court said there was ‘no evidence’ that the appointments were ‘part of any relevant pattern or practice, let alone appointments made in pursuance of anything capable of being described as a policy’.

Jolyon Maugham

Good Law Project executive director Jolyon Maugham

Lord Justice Singh and Mr Justice Swift also held that, while the Runnymede Trust has standing to bring the PSED challenge, the Good Law Project did not. 

Referring to the group’s articles of association, they said that it ‘cannot be right as a matter of principle that an organisation could in effect confer standing upon itself by drafting its objects clause so widely that just about any conceivable public law error by any public authority falls within its remit’.

The judges said: ‘We are not persuaded that such a general statement of objects as is now set out in the Good Law Project’s articles of association can confer standing on an organisation. That would be tantamount to saying that the Good Law Project has standing to bring judicial review proceedings in any public law case.’

The court added: ‘It cannot be supposed that the Good Law Project now has carte blanche to bring any claim for judicial review no matter what the issues and no matter what the circumstances.’

Previous judicial observations about whether the Good Law Project has standing should be considered with ‘caution’, the judges also said, in light of the Court of Appeal’s recent ruling on a different pandemic-related judicial review brought by the group. 'The claim brought by Good Law Project fails in its entirety,' they ruled. 

In a statement following the judgment, the Good Law Project said: 'By ruling that Boris Johnson and his government acted unlawfully, the court accepted the Runnymede Trust and Good Law Project’s argument that the recruitment process ignored the need to eliminate discrimination against, and advance equality of opportunity for, disabled and ethnic minority communities in the UK.'