Attorney-General v De Keyser’s Royal Hotel [1920] AC 508

During the First World War, the Crown requisitioned De Keyser’s Royal Hotel for military use. The owners sought compensation under the legislation governing the acquisition and use of property for defence purposes. The government argued that it could instead rely on the royal prerogative and that the claimed statutory compensation was consequently unavailable. The dispute therefore concerned the legal basis on which the government had taken possession and the consequences for the owners. It reached the House of Lords as a question about overlapping statutory and prerogative powers.

Whether the Crown could rely on prerogative power to requisition the hotel without the compensation protections of the statutory scheme covering the same exercise of power.

The House of Lords held that the owners were entitled to compensation under the applicable statutory scheme. Where Parliament has regulated an executive power and imposed conditions protecting the subject, the Crown cannot exercise an overlapping prerogative to avoid those conditions. The government’s action therefore had to be justified by reference to the legislation, including its compensation provisions. The reasoning did not depend on denying that a prerogative power had historically existed. It concerned the effect of parliamentary intervention upon its exercise in the same field. The decision limits executive choice of legal route where that choice would defeat the statutory protections attached to an authorised interference with private property.

Where legislation regulates the exercise of a power previously exercisable under the prerogative, the executive must comply with the statutory conditions. It cannot invoke the overlapping prerogative to avoid Parliament’s safeguards, including the compensation provisions applicable in De Keyser.

De Keyser prevents government from choosing a prerogative route simply to avoid statutory safeguards governing the same activity. The distinction is between existence of a prerogative and its availability where Parliament has regulated the field. The case supports analysis of executive accountability to legislation, including later disputes over the use of prerogative powers. It does not mean that any statute mentioning a broad policy area abolishes every related prerogative. The scope and intention of the particular enactment remain essential.