Attorney General V Blake House of Lords

Attorney General v Blake, [2001] 1 A.C. 268 (2000)
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APPEAL from the Court of Appeal
This was an appeal by leave of the House of Lords
(Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, Lord Hutton and Lord
Hobhouse of Woodborough) granted on 22 April 1998,
by the defendant, George Blake, from a decision of
the Court of Appeal (Lord Woolf MR, Millett and
Mummery LJJ) on 16 December 1997, allowing the
Attorney General's appeal from a decision of Sir
Richard Scott V-C, who on 19 April 1996 dismissed
an action brought by the Attorney General for a
declaration that the Crown was beneficially entitled to
copyright in a literary work entitled No Other Choice;
claiming damages against the defendant for breach
of fiduciary duty and infringement of copyright; and
seeking an order for payment to the Crown of all
moneys received or to be received by the defendant
from the publishers, Jonathan Cape Ltd, under a
contract entered into between the defendant and the
publishers for the publication of the literary work as
moneys by which the defendant had been or would be
unjustly enriched.
The facts are stated in the opinions of their Lordships.
Richard Clayton
and 
Natasha Joffe
for the defendant.
The Attorney General's power to prevent breaches
of the criminal law by injunctions is derived from
the general power of the Attorney General as
the guardian of the public interest to intervene in
civil proceedings to protect public law rights. Such
injunctions have typically been sought where the
penalties for committing an offence are insufficient to
prevent further crimes. A similar but more narrowly
defined power is conferred upon local authorities: see
Stoke-on-Trent City Council v B & Q (Retail) Ltd
[1984] AC 754 .
The offence alleged against the defendant is the
submission of the manuscript. The information it
contains is not confidential and its disclosure does not
damage the public interest. It was expressly conceded
before the Vice-Chancellor that in writing the book the
defendant did not commit any breach of his duty of
confidence. There is therefore no reason to characterise
the submission of the manuscript in itself as a serious
criminal offence. The characterisation should not be
affected by the notoriety of the defendant's convictions
in 1961 and his subsequent escape. The receipt of the
moneys by the defendant from writing his book is not
a breach of the criminal law. The Attorney General
focuses less on the offence and more on the defendant's
notoriety.
There is no warrant for extending the common law to
enable the Attorney General on public policy grounds
to seize the fruits of a criminal offence. It is not open
to a court to create common law powers to take away
property rights. The jurisdiction which purportedly
permits chief constables to freeze the proceeds of a
crime pending a possible prosecution does not assist
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the Attorney General. The courts have not
identified any basis in law which entitles such an
injunction to be granted and no power to do so exists.
[Reference was made to Chief Constable of Kent v V
[1983] QB 34 ; Chief Constable of Hampshire v A Ltd
[1985] QB 132 ; Chief Constable of Leicestershire v
M [1989] 1 WLR 20 and P v Liverpool Daily Post
and Echo Newspapers plc [1991] 2 AC 370 .]. The
police have no cause of action to require a bank to
pay money over to a chief constable. The power to
seize moneys which have no evidential value involves
a considerable extension of the principles in Chic
Fashions (West Wales) Ltd v Jones [1968] 2 QB 299
. The suggestion that the police have a general power
to seize goods which are not stolen or evidence of
a crime is inconsistent with Malone v Metropolitan
Police Comr [1980] QB 49 .
Only the legislature has power to interfere with
property rights. However, a statute cannot deprive
individuals of property rights except by clear and
unambiguous language: see R v Secretary of State for
the Home Department, Ex p Simms [2000] 2 AC 115
. Accordingly, the court cannot expropriate property
unless authorised by statute and cannot override vested
rights by extending the common law to confiscate
the proceeds of crime. The Court of Appeal therefore
erred in concluding that it had jurisdiction to grant the
injunction sought.

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