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Novak Djokovic through Australia’s Pandemic Looking Glass: Denied Natural Justice, Faulted by Open Justice and Failed by a Legal System Unable to Stop the Arbitrary Use of State Power

2022; RELX Group (Netherlands); Linguagem: Inglês

10.2139/ssrn.4024648

1556-5068

Andrew Higgins,

Law in Society and Culture

This editorial note considers the legal controversy surrounding Novak Djokovic’s deportation from Australia, and the Full Federal Court of Australia’s rejection of Djokovic’s judicial review of the Minister’s decision to cancel his visa in Djokovic v Minister for Immigration [2022] FCAFC 3. It is not, however, a conventional case note, but rather uses the case to consider the ‘public health’ (to adapt a phrase) of the rule of law and the legal system in Australia as revealed by the pandemic. It sets out the public health background and the political context for the Australian Government’s decision to cancel his visa to play in the Australian Open, before considering Djokovic’s unsuccessful legal challenge to the decision. The case highlights the extremely limited substantive and procedural rights individuals enjoy under Australian law as against the state (especially, but not only, non-citizens). If the level of judicial deference to the opinion of the Minister in Djokovic is legally sound – though there are good reasons to think the decision is wrong - there is an urgent need for some form of bill of rights to guarantee fundamental process and substantive rights to whomever the State or the public might turn on, whether it be Serbian tennis superstars, Czech doubles specialists, refugees or whistle-blowers.