Bringing Judicial Review into Sports
- 12 November 2025
- SLAM
Judicial review (“JR”) functions as a fundamental safeguard in our legal system ensuring that public decision-makers with power over individuals act within legal bounds and respect basic rights: and recently, its role has become ever more prominent. In 2024 alone there were approximately 3,000 JR applications, a 17% increase from 2023, reflecting growing public expectations that authority and governing bodies will be subject to oversight and accountability.
Against this backdrop a pressing question arises: should Sports Governing Bodies (SGBs) be subject to judicial review?
While SGBs often wield immense control over athletes, coaches and other stakeholders making decisions that can end careers and affect people’s reputation and livelihood, most remain outside the formal ambit of JR. Traditionally, SGBs have been treated as private entities operating under contractual terms with their members. The landmark decision in ex parte Aga Khan held that although the Jockey Club exercised substantial regulatory authority over horse-racing, it did so via private law arrangements, creating a contractual relationship and therefore was not a “public body” amenable to JR.
However, the sports landscape is rapidly changing. SGBs now receive public funding, are subject to government oversight and often mirror the functions of official regulators. These developments raise a strong argument that the distinction between private and public law in sport is ever increasingly blurred.
Yasin Patel and Caitlin Haberlin-Chambers explore the evolving case for subjecting SGBs to JR and examine three interconnected themes:
i) the functional test for public law functions,
ii) government intervention in sport, and,
iii) the protection of human rights.
Public function test
Only decisions made by public bodies can be challenged by way of JR – so what is a public body? To have standing, the public body must have a sufficient interest in the public. Courts have shifted from a formal test – “Is it a public body?” – to a functional approach – “What kind of power is being exercised?”
So why do SGBs generally fail the test? First, members consent to the jurisdiction of SGB rules and disciplinary procedures. Membership of a SGB is generally voluntary: by choosing to participate, individuals and clubs enter a contractual relationship with the SGB. They are therefore deemed to have accepted its constitution, rules, and disciplinary procedures. This contractual basis is why it is often difficult for individuals to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (“CAS”) when SGBs have excluded it as a viable option.
The second factor is the lack of governmental underpinning. JR exists primarily to provide a check on government power, safeguarding the rule of law. Where there is no connection to the state, JR is traditionally unavailable. Yet, as we will explore, there is increasing government involvement in sport through funding, oversight, and regulatory frameworks.
It is not suggested that JR should extend to every contractual dispute between SGBs and their members, as was the concern in Khan. Rather, the argument is that when a decision has a public law character, thereby passing the public function test, judicial oversight is both appropriate and necessary.
Government underpinning
Government involvement in the regulation and funding of sport is becoming increasingly significant.
Regulation
This is exemplified by recent calls for the creation of independent regulators to address systemic governance failures and restore public confidence in sporting institutions. One such watershed moment was the introduction of the Football Governance Act 2025 which received royal assent on 21 June 2025. The Act established the Independent Football Regulator (“IFR”), described as the “biggest reform to football governance in a generation.” The IFR’s objectives are to protect and promote the financial soundness of regulated clubs, ensure the financial resilience of English football, and safeguard the heritage of the sport.
The Act effectively creates a JR-type review within a hybrid appeal-tribunal structure, highlighting the government’s intent to prioritise transparency and accountability in football administration. The Act allows an appeal to be made to the Competition Appeal Tribunal (“CAT”). Section 85(2) provides that the “Tribunal must determine…by applying the same principles as would be applied by the High Court in determining proceedings on judicial review”.
The emergence of independent regulators demonstrates that when SGBs exercise functions akin to public authorities, the law increasingly recognises the appropriateness and, in some cases, necessity of JR as a means of protecting individual rights and reinforcing public confidence in sporting governance.
Funding
It goes without saying that the government provides substantial funding to sport across the UK. As part of the government’s “Plan for Change”, major sporting events and grassroots initiatives receive over £900 million in public funding. However, this funding is a mechanism by which the government has a significant means of controlling or heavily influencing SGBs by attaching strict conditions and governance standards to the public money they receive.
As Henry Goldschmidt observed, “the financial consequences for non-compliant organisations can be severe”. For example, in August 2025, the Rugby Football League was informed that the next payment of a £16 million government funding package was at risk unless it provided satisfactory explanations regarding recent board changes to Sport England.
Government funding is essential to support athletes, develop grassroots sports, and maintain sporting facilities. This article does not critique the investment itself but highlights that public funding inherently creates a degree of control and oversight. Where SGBs exercise powers that affect athletes’ careers, reputations, or access to publicly funded opportunities, such control provides a strong basis for applying public law principles, including judicial review.
Public funding establishes a clear link between SGBs and government accountability. When SGBs benefit from substantial public resources, their decisions should be subject to the same standards of fairness, reasonableness, and transparency expected of public authorities, reinforcing the case for judicial oversight.
Taken together, the introduction of independent regulators and the reliance on public funding illustrate that SGBs are no longer purely private actors. When exercising powers that affect athletes’ careers, reputations, or access to publicly funded opportunities, SGB decisions take on a public law character. This creates a strong case for JR as a mechanism to protect individual rights and ensure that the rule of law is upheld in sport. This is particularly the case when there are times when individuals do not have the advice, representation or legal expertise when challenging SGBs and there is no public accountability for the SGBs to ensure that it is fair.
Protection of Human Rights
At its core, JR serves as a vital mechanism for the protection of individual rights and the promotion of lawful, rational, and fair decision-making by public authorities. It provides a critical check on the exercise of power by ensuring that decision-makers are held accountable to legal standards and fundamental principles of justice.
SGBs often wield wide-reaching authority over athletes, coaches, and other stakeholders – frequently making decisions that can have profound, even career-ending consequences. While SGBs operate internal complaints procedures, these typically require aggrieved parties to exhaust the internal mechanism before seeking further redress. In many cases, Sport Resolutions UK serves as the final route of appeal under SGB rules. Many SGBs expressly exclude the right to appeal to CAS, leaving the individual with no independent forum to challenge decisions.
In practice, after an unfavourable decision by Sport Resolutions, JR may be the only remaining mechanism capable of providing external scrutiny. However, its narrow accessibility creates a regulatory gap: decisions with serious professional and reputational consequences may be effectively insulated from challenge. The absence of a guaranteed independent appellate body, combined with procedural and jurisdictional barriers to JR, means that SGBs may not always be held sufficiently in check despite the magnitude of the powers they exercise.
Excluding SGBs from the scope of JR risks leaving individuals without any effective remedy, particularly where internal procedures lack independence, fail to meet basic standards of natural justice, or as basic as failing to provide a fair hearing. JR is not a mere technicality; it is a constitutional safeguard designed to ensure that no decision-maker, however powerful, can act unlawfully, irrationally, or unfairly without accountability.
Ultimately, the rule of law demands that no entity, whether governmental or private, should exercise significant coercive power without oversight. Where SGBs make decisions that can define or end sporting careers (both at an amateur and professional level), JR is essential to prevent arbitrariness, protect human rights, and maintain public confidence in the integrity of sports governance.
Conclusion
Ex parte Aga Khan was decided over three decades ago, in a very different sporting landscape. Since 1993, sport has evolved dramatically: participation has increased, public and private investment has surged, and the influence of SGBs over individuals’ careers and livelihoods has deepened. With this growth has come a corresponding rise in concerns about transparency, accountability, and fairness in how SGBs operate, which has been recognised by the government itself with growing calls for intervention.
As SGBs increasingly perform functions that are regulatory in nature – affecting access to publicly funded opportunities, international representation, and the integrity of sport – they begin to resemble public bodies in both form and function. JR must adapt to reflect these realities.
While not every internal dispute should be subject to public law scrutiny, where SGBs exercise power that has a significant public impact, it is both logical and just that their decisions be subject to judicial oversight. Importantly, SGBs frequently reap the benefits of government intervention, such as funding, regulatory support, and enhanced legitimacy, yet often seek to decline the corresponding obligations of accountability and public law scrutiny.
Upholding the rule of law in sport is not about undermining autonomy; it is about ensuring that power – wherever it is exercised – is wielded fairly, lawfully, and in the public interest. Where athletes’ careers, reputations, and access to publicly funded opportunities are at stake, JR provides an essential safeguard against arbitrariness, protecting both individual rights and the integrity of sport.