Category: elections

Regina (Shindler and another) v Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and another [2016] EWCA Civ 469

‘The claimants were British nationals who, exercising their rights of free movement, had moved to European Union member states in the 1980s and remained living respectively in Italy and Belgium. They were not entitled to vote in the European Union referendum by section 2 of the European Union Referendum Act 2015 since they had last been registered to vote in a United Kingdom election more than 15 years ago. The 2015 Act adopted the franchise for United Kingdom parliamentary elections, including the 15-year rule. The claimants sought judicial review, claiming that the 15-year rule constituted a restriction on their rights of free movement which was not objectively justified, by way of a declaration that section 2 of the 2015 Act was incompatible with their directly effective European Union law rights. Article 50(1) of the EU Treaty provided that any member state could withdraw from the European Union in accordance with its own constitutional arrangements. The Divisional Court granted permission to proceed but refused the claim, holding that (i) section 2 of the 2015 Act fell within the scope of European Union law so that their rights of free movement were in principle engaged; (ii) section 2 was not a restriction on their rights of free movement; (iii) if section 2 were such a restriction, it was objectively justified as a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate objective, namely of testing the strength of a British citizen’s links with the United Kingdom over a significant period of time; and (iv) the claimants were not disentitled to a remedy on account of delay.’

WLR Daily, 20th May 2016

Source: www.iclr.co.uk