Padfield: A Discretion Must Serve the Policy and Objects of the Act

In one line

There is no such thing as an unfettered statutory discretion, because Parliament gave the power for a purpose and the courts decide what that purpose was.

In the wording a student can write in an exam: Padfield v Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food held that Parliament must have conferred a discretion with the intention that it should be used to promote the policy and objects of the Act; that the policy and objects are determined by construing the Act as a whole and construction is always a matter of law for the court; and that if the Minister so uses his discretion as to thwart or run counter to that policy, the court may intervene.

The case

Padfield v. Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, [1968] AC 997, [1968] UKHL 1, decided 14 February 1968.

Facts. Under the Milk Marketing Scheme made under the Agricultural Marketing Act 1958, producers had to sell their milk to the Milk Marketing Board, which fixed a different price for each of eleven regions, the differences reflecting the cost of transporting milk to centres of consumption. The differentials had been fixed many years earlier when transport was cheaper. South Eastern producers had pressed the Board for years to increase them and had failed, the Board acting by a majority in which they were outnumbered. Section 19(3)(b) of the Act allowed the Minister to refer a complaint about the operation of a scheme to a Committee of Investigation. In January 1965 the South Eastern producers made a formal complaint and asked that it be referred. The Minister refused, writing that under the Act he had an unfettered discretion whether to refer a particular complaint, and giving reasons which included the political difficulty that would follow a report in the complainants' favour.

Held. An order of mandamus went, requiring the Minister to consider the complaint according to law, and the case was remitted to the Queen's Bench Division. Lord Reid held that Parliament must have conferred the discretion with the intention that it should be used to promote the policy and objects of the Act; that the policy and objects must be determined by construing the Act as a whole, and construction is always a matter of law for the court; and that if the Minister, by reason of having misconstrued the Act or for any other reason, so uses his discretion as to thwart or run counter to the policy and objects of the Act, the law would be very defective if persons aggrieved were without a remedy. He rejected the argument that the only two possibilities were a duty to refer every complaint or an unfettered discretion to refuse. Lord Morris of Borth-y-Gest dissented.