Holzinger v Attorney-General (Qld)

The applicant, Holzinger, sought judicial review of the Attorney-General for Queensland's decision not to refer his petition for a pardon or, alternatively, that his petition be referred to the Court of Appeal under section 672A of the Criminal Code (Qld). Holzinger had been found guilty of three counts of rape and four counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16 years in 2015. After losing his appeal and being refused special leave to appeal by the High Court, he petitioned the Governor for a pardon or for referral to the Court of Appeal. The Governor declined to pardon him, and the Attorney-General also declined to refer the case to the Court of Appeal. Holzinger sought to challenge these decisions under the Judicial Review Act 1991 (Qld).

The primary legal issues before the court were whether the Attorney-General's decision not to refer Holzinger's petition was a "decision of an administrative character made under an enactment" and whether Holzinger was a person aggrieved by this decision. Additionally, the court needed to determine whether the decision was amenable to judicial review. Holzinger argued that the decision was both administrative and under an enactment, and that he was aggrieved because his interests were adversely affected. The Attorney-General contended that the decision was not amenable to judicial review under Part 3 of the Act, or alternatively, that Holzinger had failed to establish his grounds for review. The intervener argued that the application should be dismissed because the decision was not amenable to review.

The court found that the Attorney-General's decision not to refer Holzinger's petition was not a decision of an administrative character made under an enactment. The court reasoned that the power to refer a petition to the Court of Appeal was not derived from an enactment but was a discretionary power exercised by the Attorney-General. The court held that such discretionary decisions are not subject to judicial review under the Judicial Review Act. Furthermore, even if the decision were administrative, the court found that Holzinger was not an aggrieved person because the decision did not adversely affect his interests in a way that the Act intended to protect. Consequently, the court dismissed the application with costs.