Roberts v Hopwood
A statutory discretion must be exercised reasonably and for proper purposes, not according to the council's own social or political views.
Facts
Poplar Borough Council in east London had statutory power to pay its employees such wages as it thought fit. In 1921 and 1922 it paid all its adult employees, men and women alike, a minimum wage of £4 a week, which was far higher than the national average and higher than the rate for similar work elsewhere, and did not reduce wages when the cost of living fell. The district auditor disallowed the excess payments, and the councillors were surcharged.
Legal principle
The House of Lords held that the payments were unlawful. Although the council had a discretion to pay such wages as it thought fit, that discretion had to be exercised reasonably and in good faith, with regard to the interests of the ratepayers. The council had allowed itself to be guided by eccentric principles of socialistic philanthropy, or by a feminist ambition to secure the equality of the sexes in the matter of wages, in Lord Atkinson's words, rather than by what was reasonable payment for the work done. Payments so far above market rates were in effect gifts, not wages, and were outside the council's powers.
Related cases on judicial review: illegality
- Attorney General v Fulham Corp [1921] 1 Ch 440
- Barnard v National Dock Labour Board [1953] 2 QB 18
- British Oxygen Co Ltd v Minister of Technology [1971] AC 610
- Bromley London Borough Council v Greater London Council [1983] 1 AC 768
- Congreve v Home Office [1976] QB 629
- Lavender & Son Ltd v Minister of Housing and Local Government [1970] 1 WLR 1231
- Padfield v Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food [1968] AC 997
- R (A) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] UKSC 37, [2021] 1 WLR 3931
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