A Gaming Club, Crockfords, sought the restoration of its gaming licence. It had historically found ways of circumventing the earlier Gaming Acts restrictions. The 1968 Act created the Gaming Board to assess their probity. They challenged the refusal saying that the hearing had not observed the rules of natural justice.
Lord Denning MR said: ‘Seeing the evils that have led to this legislation, the Board can and should investigate the credentials of those who make application to them. They can and should receive information from the police in this country or abroad, who know something of them. They can, and should, receive information from any other reliable source. Much of it will be confidential. But that does not mean that the applicants are not to be given a chance of answering it. They must be given the chance, subject to this qualification? I do not think they need tell the applicant the source of their information, if that would put their informant in peril: or otherwise be contrary to the public interest. Even in a criminal trial, a witness cannot be asked who is his informer. ‘
Lord Denning MR, Wilberforce L, Phillimore LJ
[1970] EWCA Civ 7, [1970] 2 QB 417, [1970] 2 All ER 528, [1970] 2 WLR 1009
Bailii
Gaming Act 1960, Gaming Act 1963, Gaming Act 1968
England and Wales
Licensing, Natural Justice
Leading Case
Updated: 10 November 2021; Ref: scu.262770