Once rights by way of licences had been granted to a party by virtue of a statute, an amendment to those licences required the Secretary to be explicit with Parliament when altering the licences. The Act provided clear rules for making amendments to licences. The Secretary purported to amend the licences to comply with a European Directive, but the new regulations did not specifically disapply the regime for amending the licences. He should have made it clear in the statutory instrument that the protections were being removed. The regulations made under section 2(2) of the 1972 Act which, if valid, took away valuable rights of Orange which they had enjoyed under the Telecommunications Act 1984, were ultra vires, on the ground that the regulations had failed explicitly to state that rights enjoyed under primary legislation were being taken away.
Citations:
Times 15-Nov-2000, Gazette 23-Nov-2000
Statutes:
Telecommunications Act 1984 12 13 14 15, Telecommunications (Licence Modification) (Standard Schedules) Regulations 1999 (1999 no 2540), European Communities Act 1972 2(2)
Citing:
Distinguished – Regina v Secretary of State for Trade and Industry ex parte Unison 1996
The 1978 Directive required consultation in the case of collective redundancies. Acts had incorrectly incorporated this requirement into English law. The error was corrected in the 1995 Regulations.
Held: Anything is ‘related to’ a Community . .
Cited by:
Cited – Oakley Inc v Animal Ltd and others PatC 17-Feb-2005
A design for sunglasses was challenged for prior publication. However the law in England differed from that apparently imposed from Europe as to the existence of a 12 month period of grace before applying for registration.
Held: Instruments . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Administrative, Media, Licensing, Constitutional
Updated: 10 April 2022; Ref: scu.88661
