Attorney General V Blake House of Lords

Attorney General v Blake, [2001] 1 A.C. 268 (2000)
© 2023 Thomson Reuters.
22
purpose was not to protect any commercial interest of
the Crown or any right of the Crown commercially to
exploit such information. Its purpose and justification
was to support and reinforce the provisions of the
criminal law to which Blake became subject by reason
of his entering the employment of the Crown and
signing the statutory declaration. It is that justification
which prevented the undertaking from amounting to an
unlawful restraint of trade and would now have to be
relied upon to justify the infringement of his freedom
to impart information.
Blake had no regard for his duty of loyalty to his
country and the Crown nor to his obligation to observe
the criminal law. Between 1951 and 1960, he disclosed
valuable secrets to foreign agents. He was later found
out and in 1961 he was, on his own plea, convicted of
five offences under the 1911 Act and sentenced to 42
years' imprisonment. He escaped in 1966 and fled to
Moscow.
In 1989, 28 years after his conviction, Blake entered
into an agreement with Jonathan Cape Ltd, an English
company, to publish a book to be written by him about
his life from 1944 onwards. He delivered the 
*294
manuscript by the end of that year and the book was
published in September 1990.
The Government however did not take any action
against the publishers Jonathan Cape even though
the Government knew of the existence of the book
before it was published. Neither Blake nor anyone
else had sought the Government's permission for the
publication. It is accepted that, by delivering the
manuscript to Jonathan Cape, Blake committed an
offence under the 1911 Act (or its successor, the 1989
Act) and broke the contractual undertaking which
he had given in 1944. It is also accepted that in
1989 and 1990, had it chosen to do so, the Crown
could have applied for an injunction to restrain the
publication of the book and would probably have been
successful. Had the court decided in its discretion not
to grant an injunction at that time, one or more of
the remedies alternative to an injunction could have
been considered and, if thought appropriate, adopted.
The present litigation has only come about because the
Crown chose not to take that course at that time.
The reason why in May 1991 these proceedings were
started was because the Crown had learnt of the
size of the advance royalty which Jonathan Cape had
agreed to pay Blake. It was about £150,000. The size
of this royalty was accounted for not by any new
facts contained in the book. The contents of the book
were, as summarised in the agreed statement of facts,
fairly unremarkable. Parts did relate to his activities
as a secret service officer but by 1989 none of the
information was any longer confidential nor was it
alleged that it would damage the public interest. The
size of the royalty was attributable to his notoriety as
an infamous spy. The Crown thought that it was wrong
that he should be allowed to enjoy the substantial
sum which resulted from the publication of the book.
Blake had escaped his just punishment for his crimes.
There was no prospect of ever bringing him back
into the jurisdiction and make him serve out his
prison sentence. Now that he had an asset within the
jurisdiction, that at least should be withheld from him;
the asset had a connection with the crimes which he
had committed.
The remarkable history of the proceedings thereafter
has been already described by my noble and learned
friend, Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead. The claim to
the royalties was originally made on recognised
proprietary and fiduciary principles. If applicable they
would have given the Crown the private law remedy
they sought, an order for the taking of an account
and the payment over of the sums found due. But
this claim could not be sustained on the facts. Too
much time had elapsed since 1960. There was no
longer anything which was confidential or which
would damage the public interest; he no longer had
any fiduciary relationship to the Crown. Sir Richard
Scott V-C dismissed the action. The Crown appealed.
Its appeal failed but before it was dismissed a new line
was adopted with the encouragement of the court and
leave to amend was given.
The public law claim was made. This relied upon the
role of the Attorney General as an officer of the Crown

---