"this is an application for judicial review which onceagain raises the important question whether, and if so in what circumstances, the decisions of the Attorney General are amenable to judicial review. The decisions under challenge in this case were taken by the Solicitor General in the absence of the Attorney General himself, but nothing turns on that: He is empowered to do so by the Law Officer's Act 1944. Two decisions are the subject of challenge; the first and most important was taken on 7th April 1994 whereby the Solicitor General decided that it was not appropriate to take proceedings for contempt of court arising out of the newspaper coverage of the trial of the applicants in July 1992. That decision was taken pursuant to section 7 of the Contempt of Court Act 1981. The second decision is said to be the refusal to give any or any sufficient reasons for the first decision".

It is not necessary to recite the facts of that case but later on in his Judgment Stuart-Smith L.J. said:-

"Jurisdiction

For many years there has been a long line of authority to the effect that the Courts will not review the exercise of the discretion of the Attorney General in relation to decisions taken in the execution of his public office ......

I am satisfied that it was the basis of reasoning in the judgment (Gouriet v Union of Post Office Workers [1977] 1All ER 696) and was so regarded when the case was considered in the House of Lords [1978] AC 435 (see per Lord Wilberforce at page 474A and Lord Edmund-Davies at page 505 E to G. Lord Justice Ormrod put the matter succintly at page 772 when he said this: