Case No. FD21P00367

24.Ms Slarks’ central premise, and one which I fully accept, is that all court orders are valid and enforceable unless and until a court sets them aside. There is, therefore, no need for an application to be made under FPR 2010, Part 18 seeking a declaration that existing orders are valid. The position has recently been confirmed by the Supreme Court in R (Majera (formerly SM (Rwanda)) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] UKSC 46, as explained by Lord Reed PSC at paragraphs 44 and 45:“44. It is a well established principle of our constitutional law that a court order must be obeyed unless and until it has been set aside or varied by the court (or, conceivably, overruled by legislation). The principle was authoritatively stated in Chuck v Cremer (1846) 1 Coop temp Cott 338; 47 ER 884, in terms which have been repeated time and again in later authorities. The case was one where the plaintiff’s solicitor obtained an attachment against the defendant in default of a pleaded defence, disregarding a court order extending the period for filing the defence, which he considered to be a nullity. The order in question had been intended to give effect to an agreement between the parties, but had mistakenly allowed the defendant longer to file a defence than had been agreed. The Lord Chancellor, Lord Cottenham, set aside the attachment, and stated at pp 342-343: “A party, who knows of an order, whether null or valid, regular or irregular, cannot be permitted to disobey it … It would be most dangerous to hold that the suitors, or their solicitors, could themselves judge whether an order was null or valid - whether it was regular or irregular. That they should come to the Court and not take upon themselves to determine such a question. That the course of a party knowing of an order, which was null or irregular, and who might be affected by it, was plain. He should apply to the Court that it might be discharged. As long as it existed it must not be disobeyed.”45. Three important points can be taken from this passage. First, there is a legal duty to obey a court order which has not been set aside: “it must not be disobeyed”. As the mandatory language makes clear, this is a rule of law, not merely a matter of good practice. Secondly, the rationale of according such authority to court orders, as explained in the second and third sentences, is what would now be described as the rule of law. As was said in R (Evans) v Attorney General (Campaign for Freedom of Information intervening)