Teoh’s case on legitimate expectations in interpretation of international treaties. Lessons for Ukraine

Abstract

The article provides a detailed overview of a famous Teoh’s case decided by High Court of Australia in 1995, focusing mainly on the issue of legal interpretation of legitimate expectations arising from ratified international treaties not implemented into the domestic legal system. The abovementioned case has been considered a novel approach of the court acting in dualist state. This approach was, however not upheld in further jurisprudence of the Australian High Court namely due to quite harsh response of administrative bodies and subsequent legislation which has further been adopted to specifically address this issue by Australian parliament. This does not, however deny the case’s significance in terms of scholarly attention to interpretation issues it has raised. Ukraine can view this case as an example as it does have its own problems with the status and interpretation of international treaties in domestic legal system. Unlike common law countries adhering to dualist approach to international law reception, Ukrainian Constitution recognizes ratified international treaties to be part of domestic legislation automatically, however it is silent on the status of these treaties in Ukrainian domestic legislation which at times causes certain problems with their interpretation and implementation. The article makes a try to solve the abovementioned issues by referring future interpreters to an alternative approach of international treaties’ interpretation to Article 8 of the Constitution of Ukraine dealing with the rule of law principle. It is the author’s position stipulated in the article that applying Article 8 in terms of the interpretation of international treaties in Ukrainian domestic law enriches the argumentation and shall be viewed as primary source of application to the issue. Keywords: international treaties, interpretation, legitimate expectations, priority of international treaties, Australia, migration law, children’s rights.