Commissioner of Police v Ryan

The Commissioner of Police appealed to the Court of Appeal of New South Wales against a declaration made by Hall J. The dispute concerned the procedural fairness afforded to Mr Ryan in relation to an application for an order made by the Commissioner.

The Court of Appeal was required to determine whether the Commissioner had failed to provide Mr Ryan with the materials upon which an application for an order was based, and whether the Commissioner had failed to serve Mr Ryan with a copy of the material on which the application for the order was based. A further issue was whether the material relied upon was incapable of supporting the making of the order.

Spigelman CJ, Santow JA, and Basten JA allowed the appeal. The Court reasoned that the Commissioner had failed to provide Mr Ryan with adequate notice of the case he had to meet, thereby breaching the principles of procedural fairness. The failure to serve the relevant material meant that Mr Ryan was not afforded a proper opportunity to respond to the grounds upon which the order was sought. Consequently, the declaration made by Hall J on 27 October 2006 and any order as to costs were set aside.