Authored by Felix Le Roux
On 24 June 2026, the Supreme Court of Appeal upheld a legal challenge brought by a member of a voluntary association against his expulsion from that association. In doing so, the court affirmed that the disciplinary decisions of private bodies may be reviewed and set aside if they fail to accord with fundamental principles of justice, which include compliance with the private body’s constitution and adherence to the rules of natural justice.
The matter arose from disciplinary decisions taken by the association’s board of management which found the member guilty on seven charges and revoked his membership. He challenged those decisions under the common law. The main issue which the court had to decide was whether the board failed to observe the rules of natural justice.
The board had notified the member of its intention to conduct disciplinary proceedings but the exact charges were only provided at the disciplinary hearing itself. The court explained that it did not matter whether proper specification in advance would have made any difference to the outcome. Fairness required the board to give the member prior notice of the charges he would have to meet at the hearing. The board also failed to put up any evidence to prove the charges, which deprived the member of his fundamental right of confrontation. Similarly, the board did not give the member details of the historical conduct relied upon to arrive at the sanction of expulsion.
The court criticised the board’s members for assuming the functions of investigating, formulating, prosecuting, and adjudicating the charges against the member, which led to a lack of functional impartiality. The functions should at least have been divided amongst different members of the board. It did not matter whether the board’s members were in fact biased; the reasonable suspicion of bias was enough for the board to have breached its duty of impartiality.
Accordingly, the board’s conduct fell short of the standards of natural justice and the court ruled in the member’s favour. However, the court highlighted the limits of its power to intervene in the decision-making of the board and remitted the matter back to the board for reconsideration.