Royal Courts of Justice
Strand
London WC2
B E F O R E:
LORD JUSTICE LAWS
MR JUSTICE EADY
HER MAJESTY'S ATTORNEY GENERAL
(CLAIMANT)
-v-
ADEKUNKE ADEJARE LAWAL
(DEFENDANT)
Computer-Aided Transcript of the Stenograph Notes of
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MR ANDREW O'CONNOR (instructed by THE TREASURY SOLICITOR, LONDON) appeared on behalf of the CLAIMANT
THE DEFENDANT APPEARED IN PERSON
J U D G M E N T
LORD JUSTICE LAWS: In this case Her Majesty's Attorney General applies for a civil proceedings order pursuant to section 42 of the Supreme Court Act 1981 against the defendant, Mr Lawal ("the litigant"). It is useful first to set out the material statutory provision:
"42.-(1) If, on an application made by the Attorney General under this section, the High Court is satisfied that any person has habitually and persistently and without any reasonable ground-
instituted vexatious civil proceedings, whether in the High Court or any inferior court, and whether against the same person or against different persons; or
made vexatious applications in any civil proceedings, whether in the High Court or any inferior court, and whether instituted by him or another ....
the court may, after hearing that person or giving him an opportunity of being heard, make a civil proceedings order..."
Then going to section (1A):
"In this section-
"civil proceedings order" means an order that
no civil proceedings shall without the leave of the High Court be instituted in any court by the person against whom the order is made;
any civil proceedings instituted by him in any court before the making of the order shall not be continued by him without the leave of the High Court; and
no application (other than one for leave under this section) shall be made by him, in any civil proceedings instituted in any court by any person, without the leave of the High Court;"
The approach to be adopted by this court to an application under section 42 has been discussed in a number of authorities. For present purposes it is enough only to cite this well-known passage from the judgment of Lord Bingham CJ (as he then was) in Attorney General V Barker [2000] FLR 759 at 764:
"'Vexatious' is a familiar term in legal parlance. The hallmark of a vexatious proceeding is in my judgment that it has little or no basis in law (or at least no discernible basis); that whatever the intention of the proceeding may be, its effect is to subject the defendant to inconvenience, harassment and expense out of all proportion to any gain likely to accrue to the claimant; and that it involves an abuse of the process of the court, meaning by that a use of the court process for a purpose or in a way which is significantly different from the ordinary and proper use of the court process."
Further, it is important to have in mind that it is not the court's task on a section 42 application to reconsider the merits of the underlying actions. The court is entitled to rely upon the conclusions of the judges who have earlier dealt with the individual proceedings (see Attorney General v Jones [1990] 1WLR 859 at 863).
The authority required for these proceedings consists in a certificate signed personally by the Solicitor General and a supplementary certificate also signed by her which corrected a spelling mistake in the litigant's name in the first certificate.
In this case there is also what may be called a threshold question which it is right that I should address, although it has not in fact been the subject of any contentious argument. It arises thus. Many of the litigant's claims relied on by the Attorney General were instituted in the Employment Tribunal. Is the Employment Tribunal an "inferior court" for the purposes of section 42(1)(b)? It seems to me to be entirely plain that it is. It has the essential attributes of a court. It administers the law of the land contained in the employment legislation. It may summon witnesses and order the disclosure of documents. Its decisions are binding and enforceable. In Peach Grey & Co v Sommers [1995] 2 All ER 513 this court held that an Industrial Tribunal (since renamed the Employment Tribunal) was an inferior court for the purposes of the provisions relating to contempt of court contained in the Rules of the Supreme Court Ord 52, r. 1(2)(a)(iii). The Employment Tribunal itself in a case by name Vidler v Unison has held that it fell within the term 'court' for the purposes of section 42. These decisions are to my mind plainly and unarguably correct.
I will first give a summary overview of the case before descending, as I must, into the detail. For the summary I am indebted to the description given in Mr O'Connor's skeleton argument for the Attorney General from which the following is adapted. The litigant has conducted campaigns of litigation against his former employers, Regional Railways NE Ltd, later renamed Northern Spirit Ltd, and against Chesterfield Borough Council. A feature of these cases has consisted in his attempts to use further proceedings to re-open issues that had already been decided against him. He has sought to challenge on appeal an extremely high proportion of court decisions made against him. With the exception of two of his actions against his former employers the litigant has been unsuccessful in all the claims in which he has been involved. Many of the proceedings that he has issued have been struck out. A very large number of interim applications and applications for permission to appeal issued by the litigant have been dismissed.
The history of the litigation is extensive, but is very helpfully collated in two documents: first, the witness statement of Rowena Wisniewska, a legal officer in the employ of the Treasury Solicitor, and secondly a chronological schedule of actions prepared by her. She has appended to her witness statement a large bundle containing the primary documentation in the litigation so far as it is available to the Attorney General.
Since 1996 the litigant has launched at least 15 sets of proceedings against both public and private bodies. The documents generated in those proceedings, or at any rate those available to the Attorney, are, as I have indicated, tabulated in the bundle produced by Miss Wisniewska. She describes the three main categories of the litigation as follows:
The litigation falls into three main categories: (a) Employment litigation - Mr Lawal has instituted at least 9 sets of proceedings in the Employment Tribunal and a further set of civil proceedings against the barrister who had assisted him in one of them. Those civil proceedings were also brought against a member of the Tribunal who had been part of the EAT who had given him an adverse decision. Two of the ET proceedings have had some success, though the final result in the second (Tab 8) is still awaited. The remainder have failed and several of these have attracted very adverse comment from the Tribunals or EATs dealing with them.
Debt recovery proceedings - in 1998 Mr Lawal's Council sought to recover a sum from Mr Lawal in respect of unpaid insurance premiums. This triggered a counterclaim and an avalanche of applications and litigation from Mr Lawal, as well as a subsequent separate set of litigation seeking to re-litigate the first action. The detail of this is set out below in respect of Tab 6.
Other: Mr Lawal has brought judicial review proceedings against the Secretary of State for the Home Department in respect of actions of the Criminal Records Bureau and against the Department for Work and Pensions, in respect, it would appear, of a decision which was in his favour. In dismissing the renewed applications for permission to apply for judicial review Sullivan J stated that the applications were hopeless."
I should read also the following introductory paragraphs from the witness statement, while acknowledging that some of it is argumentative:
The claims at tabs 4 and 6 were instituted by Chesterfield Borough Council against Mr Lawal and the Attorney-General relies upon the numerous unmeritorious applications made by Mr Lawal within the second of those claims for the purposes of these proceedings ... In particular, the second of those claims, which was for debt recovery, prompted Mr Lawal to make at least 16 applications, of which at least 12 were vexatious. These applications included applications for committal of members of the Council as well as of an officer of the court, injunction applications, strike out applications, appeals and applications to set aside, as well as one application for judicial review. None of these were successful.
Similarly, the bare figure of 15 sets of proceedings conceals within it countless applications and appeals - again, the vast majority of which have been without any merit whatsoever.
The litigation appears to follow a pattern. Faced with an adverse decision, be it from a judge or an individual with a decision-making function (e.g. a prospective employer who does not offer him a job), Mr Lawal's response is to litigate. He has put both public and private bodies to considerable costs in defending his actions, or (as in the case at Tab 6) his applications. He has made various utterly unmeritorious applications to commit members of the Chesterfield Borough Council and the judiciary for contempt and sought to appeal a great many of the decisions.
Nor is this confined to decisions adverse to Mr Lawal. In the employment proceedings at Tab 7 Mr Lawal sought to appeal a decision of the ET that he was not required to pay a deposit. In judicial review proceedings he sought to review a decision in respect of a benefit claim which was in his favour (Tab 18).
Further, his motives are, at least in some cases, suspect. In one set of employment proceedings (Tab 9) Mr Lawal admitted that he sought to trap the employers. This sentiment of being 'set up' for a race discrimination claim was also expressed by the Respondent in the evidence given to the ET in the proceedings at Tab 7.
Finally, Mr Lawal's desire to litigate has not abated over time nor is there any indication that it will. After being refused permission to apply for judicial review on 15 July 2003 Mr Lawal indicated that he would be petitioning the House of Lords."
Now I will turn to the individual sets of proceedings. Tab 1 refers to a claim launched in 1991, so before the main batch of proceedings, in the Sheffield Industrial Tribunal. It was issued against Regional Railways North Eastern Ltd. The claim was to the effect that the litigant had been the victim of race discrimination in having been denied promotion. There are no supporting documents. It seems the claim was dismissed in 1992. It is included in the evidence primarily as background, though there is a cross reference to it in one of the later sets of proceedings.
Tab 2 takes us forward to 1996 when this claim was issued in the Sheffield Industrial Tribunal against Regional Railways NE Ltd and the Department of Social Security Contributions Agency. The claim concerned the provision of an allegedly erroneous Form P60 by the litigant's employers. Out of this the litigant constructed a complaint under section 20 of the Race Relations Act 1976. The proceedings were withdrawn on the litigant being informed that the Industrial Tribunal had no jurisdiction to entertain a claim under section 20.
Tab 3 documents a claim in which the litigant was successful, so obviously these proceedings were not vexatious. The claim was again against Regional Railways NE Ltd. The complaint was one of race discrimination. It related to the employers' failure to deal properly with a specific incident on 19th September 1995. The litigant was award £14,850 odd, including interest.
Tab 4. The action here is also included for completeness only. The litigant was the defendant in proceedings brought by the local authority for possession of premises for nonpayment of rent. A suspended possession order was made on 26th November 1997.
Tab 5. These proceedings were issued in the Sheffield Industrial Tribunal on 16th September 1997 against the litigant's employers, who were now named Northern Spirit Ltd. The claim was for compensation for racial discrimination resulting in unfair constructive dismissal. The litigant alleged that he had been harassed at work for having brought the proceedings to which I have referred at tab 1. On 10th August 1998 the Industrial Tribunal held that the litigant had not been dismissed; that he was estopped from complaining of race discrimination as regards events occurring before 16th December 1995, when he had issued his claim under tab 3, because he should have brought forward his whole case then; and there was no jurisdiction to entertain his complaints of race discrimination concerning events between 17th December 1995 and 6th December 1996 because the originating application was presented out of time and there was no good reason to extent time. The Industrial Tribunal held that the application was frivolous and made an order for costs against the litigant. The litigant sought to appeal.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) refused leave on 17th December 1999. The litigant applied to the Court of Appeal. Leave there was refused by Brooke LJ on 4th April 2000 on the ground that there were no real prospects of success.
Tab 6 is a claim brought by the Chesterfield Borough Council to which the litigant was the defendant. The claim was brought by the local authority to recover a small debt of £36.96. At length the local authority obtained judgment. The litigant's counterclaim was dismissed and the matter was sent back for enforcement, but that was two-and-a-half years down the road. The importance of the case for present purposes lies in the extraordinary number and nature of applications made by the litigant in the course of the proceedings. The counterclaim issued by him, judging by his affidavit of 19th November 1998, included allegations of:
" ... per incuriam, bias, improper conduct, abuse of process, abuse of power" and race discrimination.
On 23rd November 1998 the litigant issued an application for an order to commit three members or officers of the council for contempt. He alleged a breach of the order of 26th November 1997, but that was the suspended possession order made in the proceedings under tab 4 against him. That application against the council members was struck out as an abuse of process by District Judge Reeson on 8th December 1998 when an order was also made that the council's small claim and the counterclaim should be heard on 11th January 1999. On the same day, that is 8th December 1998, the litigant launched an appeal against the district judge's order of that day alleging "bias, improper conduct, procedural irregularity."
The next day, 9th December 1998, he applied for a committal order against "an officer of the court". That apparently related to an order that had been made on 4th December 1998, but all that happened then was that certain matters were put over to be heard at the appointment already fixed before the district judge for 8th December 1998. On 14th December 1998 the litigant applied for what he described as an "interlocutory judgment".
On 30th December 1998 he applied for an injunction against the local authority. That was dismissed by District Judge Lipman on 27th January 1999 who made an order for costs which were assessed.
On 11th January 1999 HHJ Pugsley dismissed the litigant's various appeals, but allowed an extension of time to the litigant within which to serve a quantified counterclaim by 18th December 1999 in default of which the counterclaim would be struck out. The arbitrations, for such they were, were relisted for hearing on 2nd February 1999.
On 22nd January 1999 District Judge Lipman dismissed an application issued by the litigant on 13th January 1999 for an injunction to prevent harassment of him by officers of the local authority. The litigant issued, or it may be only proposed to issue, a further application on 1st September 1999. His manuscript grounds in support of it are unintelligible.
On 2nd February 1999 the local authority obtained judgment for the sum claimed together with costs and the litigant's counterclaim was dismissed. Six days later on 8th February 1999 the litigant completed a claim form to seek permission for judicial review in the High Court seeking a fresh trial on the grounds of apparent bias by the judge. However it looks as if the judicial review papers were not actually lodged.
Then on 12th February 1999 he also applied in the county court for the order of 2nd February 1999 to be set aside on the ground of misconduct by the arbitrator. That application was dismissed by His Honour Judge Machin on 12th April 1999 when he also dismissed the litigant's application for permission to appeal. Meantime, a warrant of execution having been issued at the local authority's behest, the litigant applied on 2nd September 1999 for a stay of execution. On 12th April 2000 the warrant was stayed for 28 days to enable an earlier order, that of 27th January 1999, to be re-served. On 17th April 2000 the litigant, incomprehensibly, issued a summons against the bailiff for damages for failure by the bailiff to levy execution.
On 2nd May 2000 he applied for the orders of 13th April 2000 (apparently because the order should have recited as its date 12th April 2000) and that of 27th January 1999 to be rescinded. He accused the relevant members of the judiciary of "impropriety and improbities", as well as bias.
On 3rd July 2000 HHJ Pugsley adjourned the litigant's applications alleging neglect to levy execution for the litigant to have an opportunity of getting some legal advice. On 25th August 2000 the litigant applied to have the case reopened and to have Judges Pugsley, Machin and Dawson disqualified from hearing it.
On 28th December 2000 the claim was transferred, it seems, to the Mansfield County Court. On 9th January 2001 at that court District Judge Atkinson ordered that the litigant's application be withdrawn. On 15th January 2001 the litigant made a further application. On 31st January 2001 the district judge, holding that this application did not appear "to relate to any matter capable of giving rise to substantive relief", ordered that the litigant should show cause why the application should not be struck out. It was struck out on 25th April 2001. In June 2001, as I understand it, the case was transferred back to Chesterfield for enforcement.
Tab 7 takes us back to the Industrial Tribunal where on 29th September 1999 the litigant issued this claim against the Chesterfield Borough Council for compensation for race discrimination in the context of his application for employment as a recovery assistant. In his form IT1 he accused the local authority of "maliciously seeking revenge" in relation to a complaint he had made against them in 1997 to the Commission for Racial Equality. In that matter the CRE had taken no further action after one meeting with the litigant.
At a pre-hearing review on 7th February 2000 the Employment Tribunal held that the litigant had no reasonable prospect of success, but declined to order the payment by the litigant of a deposit, which is a procedural step open to them, on the ground that he was without means. The litigant sought to appeal this order even though the executive part of it relating to the deposit had been in his favour.
On 7th March 2000 he sought extended reasons from the Employment Tribunal. On 21st March 2000 the ET indicated that the summary reasons and full reasons were the same. On 22nd March 2000, the next day, the litigant sought to appeal that decision. On 26th January 2001 the EAT at length held that his appeal concerning the deposit was "entirely misconceived." Meantime on 18th December 2000 the litigant's substantive claim was heard. That was comprehensively rejected by the ET on 16th October 2000. On 19th October 2000 the litigant presented a notice of appeal against that result. On 20th October 2000 he applied to the ET for a review; that was refused on 26th October 2000. The EAT heard his application for an appeal on 9th May 2001 and dismissed it on the ground that it was hopeless.
Tab 8 was another claim in the ET brought against Northern Spirit Ltd on 7th October 1999. The litigant asserted race discrimination arising out of his employers' failure or alleged failure to provide him with a reference in about February 1998. His employment had in fact ended about 11 months before that. Now in these proceedings the litigant has scored two signal successes on issues of law. The substantive merits have still not been decided. This unusual state of affairs requires a little explanation. The ET declined jurisdiction in the case on the ground that the alleged act of discrimination, the failure or refusal to provide a reference, postdated the litigant's employment. He appealed to the EAT. In the EAT he took the point that the respondent's counsel, Mr Underhill QC, had been a part-time judge of the EAT since April 2000 and this infected the impartiality of the EAT proceedings.
At length, on 18th December 2001, the EAT rejected the litigant's arguments both on the recorder objection (as the issue about the constitution of the EAT was called) and also the jurisdiction point as to discrimination said to have taken place after the termination of employment. Now to take the matter shortly, both of these issues were litigated to their Lordships' House, the jurisdiction point in fact being determined in another case in the House of Lords by name D'Souza. On both issues the position taken by the litigant was vindicated. The House of Lords remitted the litigant's case to the Court of Appeal were it was listed for hearing on 19th February 2004 before Peter Gibson LJ, Longmore LJ and myself. The respondents had earlier agreed, indeed had proposed, that in light of the House of Lords' ruling the matter should be remitted for hearing afresh in the ET.
Unaccountably, the litigant at first objected to that course being taken though it was entirely in his favour. At length that was the order which the Court of Appeal made. The Court of Appeal also ordered that the litigant have his costs of the appeal up to the time when the respondent made the offer of remission. The litigant's substantive claim is still pending in the Employment Tribunal and he has told us this morning that he has been informed that the month of May has been set aside for a hearing.
Tab 9 shows yet another application to the ET issued on 21st September 2000 for compensation for race discrimination. The litigant was employed as a security guard by Securitec Group UK Ltd from 20th June 2000 until 19th September 2000 when he resigned two days before these proceedings were issued. The complaint was that he had been bullied by a supervisor in being required to remove an earpiece that was thought to be a Walkman, that the respondent had failed to investigate the complaint properly, and had also caused the litigant's name to be misspelt on his payslip so as to include the letters KKK. By its judgment of 10th July 2001 the ET comprehensively rejected the litigant's claims. It is worth setting out this passage from the ET's decision, at tab 9 page 256:
"However, during the course of cross-examination the applicant stated that he did not need the earpiece for that purpose, it didn't work and he could concentrate without it. He went on to say
"It is an entrapment. I was waiting for someone to tell me not to do it. They fell into the trap."
We find that as well as seriously damaging the credibility of this applicant, this statement also tends to lead to the conclusion that his intention was to "manufacture" a complaint to bring before this Tribunal."
The litigant's prospective appeal was dismissed by the EAT on 17th December 2001.
The proceedings in tab 10 were issued in the Sheffield Industrial Tribunal on the same day, 21st September 2000, as those in tab 9. This time the respondent was the Chesterfield Law Centre. The litigant claimed race discrimination had stopped him being interviewed for a job as an advice worker. These proceedings were markedly similar to those issued against the Chesterfield Borough Council under tab 7. In Form IT1 in this case the litigant asserted:
"because I disclosed the fact of having done a "preventative action" against a former employer, this personnel management is shown to have victimised me for past action."
By a judgment on a prehearing review on 15th February 2001 the ET expressed the view that this application had no prospect of success. They ordered the litigant to pay a deposit of £150 as a condition of proceeding further. He failed to pay. The application was struck out by order of 26th March 2001. The litigant lodged a notice of appeal to the EAT. His appeal was dismissed on 10th September 2001. His grounds of appeal to the Court of Appeal alleged conspiracy and equitable fraud by the ET. There was a hearing before Mummery LJ on 20th November 2001 when the litigant did not attend. Permission to appeal was refused. On 7th February 2002 Mummery LJ refused to reinstate the permission application.
There followed two sets of proceedings issued by the litigant in the Chesterfield County Court about which we really have no details. All that Miss Wisniewska can say is this:
These proceedings were commenced in the Chesterfield County Court. Unfortunately the court has now destroyed these files. However, in relation to the first claim, I believe that although the claim was issued, no further action was taken. As to the second, I am informed by a letter from the Court Service dated 24 May 2002 that 'an award made by a Tribunal was set aside'."
Those two sets of proceedings appear at tabs 11 and 12.
Tab 13 concerns a claim which was not in fact issued. In May 2001 the litigant sought to issue proceedings in the Chesterfield County Court naming the defendant or defendants as "the Judiciary and the Administration Court Service management Chesterfield County Court." Part of the complaint seems to have been based on the order of the Mansfield County Court remitting the claim in tab 6 back to the Chesterfield County Court for enforcement.
On 10th May 2001 the court returned the claim form to the litigant unissued on the instructions of the judge on the ground that the named defendant was not a person recognised by the law. The litigant sought to dispute this by letter dated 8th June 2001.
The claim in tab 14 was also never issued in the event, but its fact are significant for this court's overall assessment of the litigant's litigious activity. The litigant sought in May 2001 to issue proceedings again in the Chesterfield County Court against: "HH Judge Pugsley (TA)" that can only mean 'trading as' "the Court Service of HM High Court of Justice District Registry for Chesterfield CC." The nature of the claim is impossible to discern because the claim form is unintelligible. The claim was returned to the litigant and it was stated in the court's letter of 6th June 2001 that the claim be struck out "as revealing no reasonable ground for bringing the claim".
Tab 15, issued on 21st June 2001 in the Chesterfield County Court against the Chesterfield County Court, the Chesterfield Borough Council and the Legal Services Commission was an attempt to relitigate matters already decided. The litigant sought to reclaim £74.46 which had been awarded to the council in the tab 6 proceedings on the grounds that those proceedings were "totally misconceived". That claim was struck out on the Court's own motion on 14th August 2001, but provision was made for that order to be set aside, varied or stayed on application made by the litigant within seven days.
Then on 22nd August 2001 on the litigant's application the case seems to have been transferred to the High Court, though it is a little difficult to understand why; it may be because the County Court was itself a defendant. On 18th October 2001 in the High Court, Master Trench made various procedural orders including the substitution of the Lord Chancellor's Department for the Chesterfield County Court.
On 15th November 2001 the litigant applied for a judgment in default. On 5th December 2001 the local authority applied for an order striking out the claim as an abuse of the process. On 14th March 2002 Burton J refused the litigant's application for permission to appeal Master Trench's order of 18th October 2001. On 7th and 29th January 2002 the litigant issued applications for committal for contempt against the Chesterfield Borough Council. On 6th February 2002 Master Trench struck out the substantive claims, save against the local authority. He excepted the local authority only because of the outstanding contempt application. The Master said this at tab 15 page 361:
"The claimant makes the point that if the present application by the third defendant succeeds and his against them is struck out he will be prevented from proceeding on his contempt application for the reason that there will be no extant proceedings in which it could be heard. This is logically correct. I am unwilling to prejudge the contempt matter as to which I have no jurisdiction, also to act as to prevent this ever coming before a court. Mr Weiselberg submits that the contempt application is in itself so weak and hopeless that I should take the robust view and proceed nonetheless to strike out this application. Such may be a justifiable pragmatic approach but it is one which I do not think I should engage upon. Instead I would propose to stay the action against the third defendant pending a decision of the Attorney General or a judge to process the contempt application. I am not willing to leave this open ended for it would be wrong for the claimant to leave this matter in abeyance and I propose to limit the stay to six months from today or earlier decision as to processing the contempt application. But for this matter I would have struck out the action against the third defendants on the basis that it too is an attempt to relitigate matters in a different court."
Then the litigant's applications for contempt were dismissed with costs by Garland J on 19th March 2002. Accordingly, on 10th May 2002, Master Trench ordered the claim against the third defendant to be struck out with costs and permission to appeal was refused. In the meantime, having been refused permission to appeal by Burton J on 14th March, on 18th March 2002 the litigant petitioned the House of Lords. On 1st May 2002 he lodged an application with the European Court of Human Rights.
Tab 16 concerns a claim also commenced in the Chesterfield County Court, but soon transferred to the Queen's Bench Division of the High Court. The first defendant in those proceedings was a member of the EAT who had heard one of the applications in the litigant's second case against Northern Spirit (tab 8). The second defendant was a member of the Bar who had acted for the litigant pro bono also in relation to the tab 8 proceedings. The claim made very grave accusations of dishonesty, conspiracy and concealing documents. The litigant sought damages of "hundreds of thousands of pounds". He applied for judgment in default before there was any default. He applied again for judgment in default on 8th October 2001.
On 5th December 2001 Master Miller struck out the claims against both defendants with costs. On 17th December 2001 the litigant applied to have the costs order set aside. On 23rd March 2002 the Master gave leave to the litigant to withdraw his application and refused the permission to appeal which was sought. On 22nd March 2002 Garland J further refused permission to appeal.
Tab 17 was an application to seek permission for judicial review, lodged on 3rd February 2003. The prospective defendant was the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. The case concerned the litigant's application for jobseeker's allowance which had actually been granted, backdated after an earlier refusal. He sought judicial review of this decision in his favour. Permission was refused by Sullivan J on 15th July 2003.
Tab 18 is another judicial review in which the papers were also lodged on 3rd February 2003. In this case the litigant sought to impugn a letter from the Criminal Records Bureau of 20th January 2003 stating that a complaint he had made was being investigated. Owen J refused permission on the papers. The litigant renewed the application in court. That application was heard on 15th July 2003 by Sullivan J: that was presumably on the same occasion as Sullivan J refused permission in the tab 17 proceedings. In this case also Sullivan J dismissed the proceedings saying they were "wholly misconceived", and had "put a number of public bodies to a great deal of unnecessary trouble".
Lastly, on 8th October 2003 Buxton LJ dealt with the litigant's renewed application to seek judicial review in the Court of Appeal in the tab 17 proceedings. Buxton LJ said this:
There is no prospect at all of relief being granted in respect of these matters. In addressing me this morning Mr Lawal has extended the matter very considerably. He has said that his real complaint is that there have been errors that should have been corrected under the Data Protection Act. But that is not the matter of which he complained in the proceedings that he brought before Sullivan J. Sullivan J was quite right in dismissing them. I do so also."
And then at paragraph 7:
"Both of these applications are entirely misconceived and I do not grant permission for either of them."
In my judgment the litigant's applications and proceedings are throughout characterised by rambling, often incomprehensible, documents of his own composition. They are in considerable measure unintelligible. Where it is possible to understand them they contain overblown, unreal and sometimes scandalous allegations. I acknowledge that in the tab 3 proceedings the litigant had a good case on the merits and in the tab 8 proceedings it transpired there were good points of law in his favour, but those cases do not, as I see the matter, begin to detract from the fact that he has now and for a considerable period of time conducted litigation in a wholly unreasonable and abusive manner. His abuse of the courts is a serious impediment to the interests of litigants with proper cases to try. I have no doubt at all but that the section 42 conditions are met and I would exercise the court's discretion thus arising by making a civil proceedings order without limit of time. The litigant's issue of an application to counterclaim for an order striking out the Attorney General's claim, "as an abuse of process and ultra vires Government ministers acting vindictively", serves forcibly to confirm my view of the case. So do the terms of the litigant's skeleton argument to which he made reference before us this morning. He appeared to be submitting that the Attorney General should have moved against him earlier if he was going to do so at all, but that would of course have invited the court to stop him litigating sooner rather than later. It is impossible to see that he has any complaint along any such lines. The Attorney General is of course concerned, out of consideration of the litigant's rights of access to the courts, not to act prematurely in moving the court under section 42.
This is a case in which the Attorney General's application is to my mind wholly justified and for the reasons I have given and in light of the history I have set out I would make the order I have indicated.
MR JUSTICE EADY: I agree.
LORD JUSTICE LAWS: There is nothing else to be said, I think, Mr O'Connor.
MR O'CONNOR: My Lord, there is no application for costs.
LORD JUSTICE LAWS: Thank you.