Legitimate Expectation

Question 1

Principle has expanded to more substantive legitimate expectations that an individual will be granted or will retain some benefit. Case:

Answer 1

R v North and East Devon Health Authority, ex parte Coughlan [2001]
Facts: the applicant, a tetraplegic following an RTC, was moved from a hospital which the health authority closed to an NHS facility for the long-term disabled. Promised that it would be her home for life, 3 years later decided to close it. Applied for JR, judge quashed the decision, holding inter alia that the applicant had been given a clear promise and the health authority had not established an overriding public interest which justified breaking that promise.
Held: the appeal would be dismissed. Lord Woolf MR: “there was no overriding public interest which justified it… here there was unfairness amounting to an abuse of power by the health authority.”