Associated Provincial Picture Houses v Wednesbury Corporation (1948)

Administrative Law · Government Privilege, Official Secrets & the Right to Information

Facts.

A cinema was licensed to open on Sundays on condition that no child under 15 be admitted. The cinema challenged the condition as unreasonable.

Issue.

On what standard may a court strike down the exercise of a discretionary power as “unreasonable”?

Held.

A court cannot substitute its own view; it can interfere only if the decision is so unreasonable that no reasonable authority could ever have come to it. The condition here was not.

Why it matters.

It gave administrative law the “Wednesbury unreasonableness” standard — the classic, deferential ground for reviewing discretion, cited in almost every discretion problem.

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