R v Ministry of Defence, Ex p Smith [1996] QB 517

Sir Thomas Bingham MR:

The court may not interfere with the exercise of an administrative discretion on substantive grounds save where the court is satisfied that the decision is unreasonable in the sense that it is beyond the range of responses open to a reasonable decision-maker. But in judging whether the decision-maker has exceeded this margin of appreciation the human rights context is important. The more substantial the interference with human rights, the more the court will require by way of justification before it is satisfied that the decision is reasonable in the sense outlined above.

畫底線的是1948年以來象徵英格蘭司法節制的Wedenesbury unreasonableness原則 (The decision is so unreasonable that no reasonable body could have come to it.)。粗體是這個傳統原則在近年來水漲船高的權利文化下所產生的一大質變。