R (Age UK) v Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 25 September 2009 |
| Neutral Citation | [2009] EWHC 2336 (Admin) |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/4585/06 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Date | 25 September 2009 |
Queen's Bench Division
Before Mr Justice Blake
Provisions permitting an employer to require retirement at the age of 65 were justified where he could show that the treatment was a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim since the government had a legitimate social policy aim: protecting the integrity and confidence in the United Kingd om labour market.
Mr Justice Blake so held in the Administrative Court of the Queen's Bench Division when dismissing a claim for judicial review by Age UK, a charity for the promotion of the welfare of older people, which challenged the legality of regulations 3(1) and 30 of the of the Employment Equality (Age) Regu lations (SI 2006 No 1031) on the ground, inter alia, that they were over-broad in what they permitted by way of derogation from the European Union principle of non-discrimination and, as such, they failed to give effect to the terms of Council Directive 2000/78/EC (OJ 2000 L303/16) and were invalid.
The charity, then called Age Concern England, commenced judicial review proceedings against the then Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform in the Administrative Court which referred a number of questions to the Court of Justice of the European Communities for a prelimina ry ruling.
That Court held that member states could lawfully provide for certain kinds of differences in employment treatment on the ground of age if those differences were objectively and reasonably justified by a legitimate aim, but that the member states had the burden of establishing the legitimacy of tha t aim to a high standard of proof: see R (Incorporated Trustees of the National Council on Ageing (Age Concern England) v Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (Case C-388/7)TLRICRUNK (The Times March 9, 2009; [2009] ICR 1080; [2009] All ER (EC) 619), The Europe an Court of Justice remitted the case to the Administrative Court, which gave permission to the Equality and Human Rights Commission and the Attorney-General to intervene.
Mr Robin Allen, QC and Mr Declan O'Dempsey for Age UK; Ms Dinah Rose, QC and Ms Emma Dixon for the secretary of state; Lord Lester of Herne Hill, QC and Ms Diya Sen Gupta for the equality commission; Mr Jason Coppel, by written submissions, for the...
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