AC-2025-LON-002122 - [2025] EWHC 2013 (Admin)

Ground 3 has two limbs. The primary one is that the Home Secretary erred in law in concluding that PA committed acts designed to influence the UK Government. At [76] of my interim relief judgment, I described this argument as “ambitious in circumstances where the action which immediately preceded the announcement of the decision to lay a proscription order was against an RAF base”. The excerpts from the claimant’s Amended Statement of Facts and Grounds set out there make it obvious that this attack at least was intended to influence the UK Government. At the permission hearing, Mr Husain argued that the decision documents show that the decision to proscribe had been taken before the attack on RAF Brize Norton was reported, and that there was at least an arguable error in the conclusion that PA’s previous attacks against defence contractors were designed to influence the UK Government. In my judgment, this point goes nowhere for two reasons, either of which would be sufficient to dispose of the point on its own.

First, attacks on defence contractors which supply the UK and allied militaries can rationally be said to be designed to influence UK Government policy, at least in circumstances where the UK permitted (and to some extent still permits) the export of some defence related goods whose final destination is Israel and this policy is controversial.

Secondly, Sir James indicated on instructions that the Home Secretary was aware of the attack on RAF Brize Norton at the time when she decided to lay the draft order. The timing suggests that she must have been. This means that, even if the claimant could show that the earlier attacks were not designed to influence the UK Government, the outcome is highly unlikely to have been substantially different. So, under s. 31(3D) of the Senior Courts Act 1981, I am obliged to refuse permission unless it is appropriate to disregard that requirement for reasons of exceptional public interest under s. 31(3E). I do not consider that there are such reasons, particularly given that the proportionality of the proscription order is being considered under ground 2 in any event.

The alternative argument under ground 3 is that there was no sufficient nexus between the terrorism identified and the organisation. This point has no merit for the reasons given at [77] and [78] of my interim relief judgment. The argument that it was wrong to proscribe an organisation most (but not all) of whose activities were lawful will in any event have to be considered under ground 2.