{"id":758,"date":"2021-02-25T16:48:49","date_gmt":"2021-02-25T16:48:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/the-judgement-is-in-the-good-law-project-government-acting-unlawfully-by-failing-to-publish-details-of-covid-related-contracts\/"},"modified":"2021-02-25T16:48:49","modified_gmt":"2021-02-25T16:48:49","slug":"the-judgement-is-in-the-good-law-project-government-acting-unlawfully-by-failing-to-publish-details-of-covid-related-contracts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/the-judgement-is-in-the-good-law-project-government-acting-unlawfully-by-failing-to-publish-details-of-covid-related-contracts\/","title":{"rendered":"The Judgement is in: The Good Law Project ‘Government acting unlawfully by failing to publish details of Covid-related contracts’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The High Court has ruled \u201cThe Secretary of State acted unlawfully by failing to comply with the Transparency Policy<\/em>\u201d and that \u201cthere is now no dispute that, in a substantial number of cases, the Secretary of State breached his legal obligation to publish Contract Award Notices within 30 days of the award of contracts.<\/em>\u201d We have won the judicial review we brought alongside Debbie Abrahams MP, Caroline Lucas MP, and Layla Moran MP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In handing down the judgment, Judge Chamberlain brought into sharp focus why this case was so important. \u201cThe Secretary of State spent vast quantities of public money on pandemic-related procurements during 2020. The public were entitled to see who this money was going to, what it was being spent on and how the relevant contracts were awarded.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Judge went on to say that if Government had complied with its legal obligations we \u201cwould have been able to scrutinise CANs and contract provisions, ask questions about them and raise any issues with oversight bodies such as the NAO or via MPs in Parliament.<\/em>\u201d  When Government eschews transparency, it evades accountability. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Government\u2019s behaviour came under criticism in the judgment. If it had admitted to being in breach of the law when we first raised our concerns, it would have never been necessary to take this judicial review to its conclusion. Instead, they chose a path of obfuscation, racking up over \u00a3200,000 of legal costs as a result.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We shouldn\u2019t be forced to rely on litigation to keep those in power honest, but in this case it\u2019s clear that our challenge pushed Government to comply with its legal obligations. Judge Chamberlain stated that the admission of breach by Government was \u201csecured as a result of this litigation and at a late stage of it<\/em>\u201d and \u201cI have no doubt that this claim has speeded up compliance<\/em>\u201d. It begs the question, if we hadn\u2019t brought this legal challenge, what other contract details would have remained hidden from view? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And whilst Government always sought to dismiss our challenge by claiming we needed to be an \u2018economic operator\u2019 to have standing, the judgment states that it is unrealistic that economic operators would have challenged Government\u2019s breach of the law in these circumstances. In other words, if we hadn\u2019t taken this case, there are not many others who could have done so. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This judgment, which can be found here<\/a>, is a victory for all of us concerned with proper governance and proof of the power of litigation to hold Government to account. But there is still a long way to go before the Government\u2019s house is in order. We have now written<\/a> to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care detailing what needs to be done to improve procurement processes and ensure value for British taxpayers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But for now, we can take a moment to celebrate this win. Thank you, as ever, for all your support.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more here: https:\/\/goodlawproject.org\/update\/the-judgment-is-in\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The High Court has ruled \u201cThe Secretary of State acted unlawfully by failing to comply with the Transparency Policy\u201d and that \u201cthere is now no…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,58],"tags":[52,44,316,38,57,32,35,42,464],"class_list":["post-758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-protect-the-frontline","category-the-nhs","tag-protectthefrontline","tag-covid-19","tag-covid19","tag-dauk","tag-personal-protective-equipment","tag-ppe","tag-protect-the-frontline","tag-the-doctors-association-uk","tag-the-good-law-project"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}