Judicial review was sought of the changes to the marking systems for GCSE English in 2012.
Held: The claim failed. Though properly brought, the failure was in the underlying structue of the qualification, and not in the respondent’s attempts to manage it.
No legitimate expectation had been created, and indeed public documentation was contrary to the expectation claimed.
The claimants had failed to demonstrate any conspicuous unfairness: ‘Ofqual could not remedy any unfairness between the January and June cohorts without creating further unfairness elsewhere. The 2012 students would have been assessed more leniently than students in earlier years. In addition, there would have been students being assessed for units in June 2012 who would have been qualifying in June 2013. They could not in fairness be assessed more strictly than others assessed in June 2012 but qualifying in that year. But if they were assessed in this more favourable manner it would mean that the unfairness now felt by the current June 2012 students would be similarly experienced by the cohort taking these units in June 2013, comparing themselves with those qualifying on the same date who had completed the relevant units in June 2012. ‘
and ‘the examiners in June made assessments which they thought fairly reflected the standard of the scripts. In the light of the fuller information then available to them, their judgments were more accurate and more reliable than the January assessments. Wider concerns about creating unfairness as between those qualifying in different years, and the need to retain the value of the qualification, strongly militated against applying the January grades to the June assessments (even with such modification as may have been necessary to account for more lenient marking) to the June assessments. There was no obligation to extend the generosity of January to June; on the contrary, there was every reason to correct the earlier erroneous standard. There was no unfairness, conspicuous or otherwise, in what they did.’
Judges:
Elias LJ, Sharp J
Citations:
[2013] EWHC 211 (Admin)
Links:
Citing:
Cited – Regina v North and East Devon Health Authority ex parte Coughlan and Secretary of State for Health Intervenor and Royal College of Nursing Intervenor CA 16-Jul-1999
Consultation to be Early and Real Listening
The claimant was severely disabled as a result of a road traffic accident. She and others were placed in an NHS home for long term disabled people and assured that this would be their home for life. Then the health authority decided that they were . .
Cited – Regina (Niazi) v Secretary of State for the Home Department CA 9-Jul-2008
The claimants sought to challenge decisions to restrict payments made to victims of miscarriages of justice. A discretionary scheme had been stopped, and payments of applicants’ costs had been restricted to Legal Help rates.
Held: The simple . .
Cited – Regina v Commissioners of Inland Revenue, ex parte Unilever plc CA 1996
The Revenue had refused to exercise a discretion in favour of the taxpayer in the same form it had granted for over twenty years. The taxpayer complained that this was unfair.
Held: The new approach to late applications, brought in without any . .
Cited – Regina v The National Lottery Commission ex parte Camelot Group Plc Admn 21-Sep-2000
The Commission had considered bids tendered in open competition to run The National Lottery. Neither of the two candidates who entered bids was considered to have satisfied all the criteria necessary to be given the relevant licence. The Commission . .
Cited – Clark v University of Lincolnshire and Humberside CA 14-Apr-2000
A student had been failed after being falsely accused of cheating, but the academic review board, on remarking the paper marked it as zero.
Held: Where a University did not have the supervisory jurisdiction of a visitor, a breach of contract . .
Cited – O’Brien and others v Independent Assessor HL 14-Mar-2007
The claimants had been wrongly imprisoned for a murder they did not commit. The assessor had deducted from their compensation a sum to represent the living costs they would have incurred if living freely. They also appealed differences from a . .
Cited – Hampshire County Council v Beer (T/A Hammer Trout Farm); Regina (Beer) v Hampshire Farmers’ Market Ltd CA 21-Jul-2003
The applicant had been refused a licence to operate within the farmer’s market. It sought judicial review of the rejection, but the respondent argued that it was a private company not susceptible to review.
Held: The decisions of the Farmers . .
Cited – Tate and Lyle Sugars Ltd v Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change and Another CA 3-Jun-2011
The company had developed a means of generating electricity from their excess sugar supplies, and challenged the support given to it by the respondent and in particular that the 2009 Order allowed the respondent to favour some types of energy . .
Cited – Bailey and Others, Regina (on The Application of) v London Borough of Brent Council and Others CA 19-Dec-2011
Appeal against failure of challenge to decision to close public libraries. . .
Cited – Greenwich Community Law Centre, Regina (on The Application of) v Greenwich London Borough Council CA 24-Apr-2012
The Centre appealed from rejection of its claim for judicial review of the defendant’s decision to discontinue financial support for the Centre. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Education, Administrative
Updated: 14 November 2022; Ref: scu.470948