On 7 August 2014 judgment was given in the Administrative Court in the case of Woods and Gorton v Chief Constable of Merseyside Police [2014] EWHC 2784 (Admin). The decision has important implications for all forces in the operation of service confidence policies (SCP). The Court held that:
- decisions under the SCP were amenable to judicial review;
- where reasons for the policy’s use in a particular case cannot be disclosed as a result of public interest immunity, then the threshold for judicial interference in the decision is very high;
- the test is whether there is clear evidence of dishonesty, bias or caprice.
Central to the decision that the court should not intervene in this case was the finding at a separate hearing, by a different judge, that the reasons for the decisions under the SCP were subject to Public Interest Immunity (PII) and could not be disclosed.