Chandler and Others v Director of Public Prosecutions
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Lord Reid,Lord Radcliffe,Lord Hodson,Lord Devlin,Lord Pearce |
| Judgment Date | 12 July 1962 |
| Docket Number | Parliamentary Archives, HL/PO/JU/4/3/1097 |
| Court | House of Lords |
| Date | 12 July 1962 |
[1962] UKHL J0712-2
Lord Reid
Lord Radcliffe
Lord Hodson
Lord Devlin
Lord Pearce
Parliamentary Archives, HL/PO/JU/4/3/1097
HOUSE OF LORDS
my lords,
This is an appeal by six persons who were convicted on 20th February, 1962, and sentenced to terms of imprisonment. They were charged with conspiracy to commit and to incite others to commit "a breach of section 1 of the Official Secrets Act 1911 namely for a purpose prejudicial to the safety or interests of the State to enter a Royal Air Force station belonging to Her Majesty at Wethersfield in the County of Essex". In dismissing their appeals the Court of Criminal Appeal certified that a point of law of general public importance was involved and granted leave to appeal to this House. The point of law relates to the proper construction of the words "purpose prejudicial to the safety or interests of the State". Before dealing with it, it is necessary to state such of the facts as are relied on by the Appellants and to notice the course taken at the trial.
The Appellants are members or supporters of an organisation known as the Committee of 100. Earl Russell, the founder of this organisation, explained in evidence that their ultimate purpose was to prevent a nuclear war and that their more immediate purpose was to get the facts about nuclear warfare known to the public by any means they could and in particular by pursuing a campaign of non-violent civil disobedience. I should say at once that no one has questioned the sincerity of any of the accused in their belief in these objectives. In pursuit of these objectives the organisation decided to have a demonstration at Wethersfield Base on 9th December, 1961. and elaborate arrangements were made for it. There is no dispute about what the accused did or attempted to do. I can conveniently quote from a letter written by one of them on 7th November:
"The working group at this end has finally decided in favour of a demonstration that will involve an attempt to occupy the base at Wethersfield. However the plan is for only a number of trained people to do this. The bulk of the demonstrators will squat by the entrances on the roadway. Our leaflet about the demonstration will simply state that we intend to immobilise the base and this is the information that will be released to the Press."
It is quite clear from the evidence, including documents, that all the accused intended and desired that a number of persons should enter the base and by obstruction prevent any aircraft from taking off for some six hours. Moreover they knew that this was unlawful and had been told that the Official Secrets Act might be used against them. In fact the demonstrators were prevented from entering the base, but that is immaterial. The question is: What did the accused conspire to do?
It is now argued for the accused that evidence on their behalf was improperly rejected at the trial. This matter first arose during the cross-examination of Air Commodore Magill, who had said that this base was occupied by squadrons of the United States Air Force assigned to the Supreme Commander Allied Forces, Europe, and that these squadrons were combatready and on constant alert: he then said that in the event of an emergency any interference with the ability of these aircraft to take off would gravely prejudice their operational effectiveness. In cross-examination objection was taken to his being asked as to the armament of these squadrons. Counsel for the accused said that they sought to adduce evidence that their purpose was not prejudicial to the interests of the State, and that the basis of the defence was that these aircraft used nuclear bombs and that it was not in fact in the interests of the State to have aircraft so armed at that time there. So, he said, it would be beneficial to the State to immobilise these aircraft. Then Counsel further submitted that he was entitled to adduce evidence to shew that the accused believed, and reasonably believed, that it was not prejudicial bat beneficial to the interests of the State to immobilise these aircraft: the jury were entitled to hold that no offence had been committed because the accused did not have a purpose prejudicial to the State, and it was for the jury to determine their purpose. He said he was going to call expert evidence and evidence of fact on which he would ask the jury to say that the accused had a reasonable belief that what they did was not prejudicial. In the course of a long argument about these matters Counsel said that his evidence would deal with the effect of exploding a nuclear bomb, and at other times reference was made to the possibility of accident or mistake, and other reasons against having nuclear bombs. He said that he wished to cross-examine as to the basic wrongness of the conception of a deterrent force and the likelihood of it attracting hostile attack. In reply the Attorney-General submitted that an objective test must determine whether the purpose of grounding aircraft was a prejudicial purpose, that the accused's beliefs were irrelevant and so was the reasonableness of their beliefs. Havers, J. then ruled that the defence were not entitled to call evidence to establish that it would be beneficial for this country to give up nuclear armament or that the accused honestly believed that it would be. Accordingly numerous questions put to Air Commodore Magill were disallowed.
The trial proceeded in accordance with this ruling of the learned judge, although a considerable number of bits of evidence crept in which might on this basis have been excluded.
At the end Havers. J. directed the jury that it was for them to say whether they were satisfied that what the accused had conspired to do was prejudicial to the safety or interests of the State. But. although he did not say so in so many words, the general effect of his summing-up was that if they accepted the evidence of Air Commodore Magill they could not do otherwise than find prejudice to the safety or interests of the State The point never emerged in a clear cut way, but I think the only safe inference is that the accused were prevented from putting the case that, judged by an objective test, it was not prejudicial to the safety or interests of the State to interfere with the operation of these aircraft because it is beneficial to the safety and interests of the State to obstruct or prevent the use of nuclear bombs.
I must now turn to the Official Secrets Act Section 1 provides:
"(1) If any person for any purpose prejudicial to the safety or interests of the State (a) approaches or is in the neighbourhood of, or enters any prohibited place within the meaning of this Act he shall be guilty of felony ?"
The section has a side note "Penalties for spying". and it was argued that this limits its scope. In my view side notes cannot be used as an aid to construction. They are mere catchwords and I have never heard of it being supposed in recent times that an amendment to alter a side note could be proposed in either House of Parliament. Side notes in the original Bill are inserted by the draftsman. During the passage of the Bill through its various stages amendments to it or other reasons may make it desirable to alter a side note. In that event I have reason to believe that alteration is made by the appropriate officer of the House?no doubt in consultation with the draftsman. So side notes cannot be said to be enacted in the same sense as the long title or any part of the body of the Act. Moreover, it is impossible to suppose that the section does not apply to sabotage, and what was intended to be done in this case was a kind of temporary sabotage.
The first word in the section that requires consideration is "purpose". One can imagine cases where this word could cause difficulty, but I can see no difficulty here. The accused both intended and desired that the base should be immobilised for a time, and I cannot construe "purpose" in any sense that does not include that state of mind. A person can have two different purposes in doing a particular thing, and even if their reason or motive for doing what they did is called the purpose of influencing public opinion that cannot alter the fact that they had a purpose to immobilise the base. And the statute says "for any purpose". There is no question here of the interference with the aircraft being an unintended or undesired consequence of carrying out a legitimate purpose.
Next comes the question of what is meant by the safety or interests of the State. "State" is not an easy word. It does not mean the Government or the Executive. "L'Etat c'est moi" was a shrewd remark, but can hardly have been intended as a definition even in the France of the time. And I do not think that it means, as Counsel argued, the individuals who inhabit these islands. The statute cannot be referring to the interests of all those individuals because they may differ and the interests of the majority are not necessarily the same as the interests of the State. Again we have seen only too clearly in some other countries what can happen if you personify and almost deify the State. Perhaps the country or the realm are as good synonyms as one can find, and I would be prepared to accept the organised community as coming as near to a definition as one can get.
Who, then, is to determine what is and what is not prejudicial to the safety and interests of the State? The question more frequently arises as to what is or is not in the public interest. I do not subscribe to the view that the Government or a Minister must always or even as a general rule have the last word about that.
But here we are dealing with a very special matter?interfering with a prohibited place, which Wethersfield was. The definition in section 3 shows that it must either be closely...
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