Internet Newsletter for Lawyers
January/February 2003, by Delia Venables

Where We Are Now
by Sir Henry Brooke

In 2000 BAILII operated on a pilot basis from AustLII's Sydney base, through the kind services of Professor Andrew Mowbray. It became a registered charitable trust in December of that year, and in February 2001 three of us had our first trustees' meeting in Laurie West-Knights' chambers in the Temple. In June we were joined by five other trustees, including one each from Scotland, Northern Ireland, Ireland and Australia.

In July 2001 we appointed our executive director, Joe Ury, and found our London home. We were then able to create a website for "new cases" in London, but the database remained in Sydney, courtesy of AustLII, until this autumn. Since then Roger Burton West, who joined us in July, has controlled the database from the London end. The University of Cork has provided a flow of Irish materials onto the site from the start.

What do we do? We load all the caselaw and statute law we can get our hands on free of charge. The official shorthandwriters, Smith Bernal, kindly gave us their archive of English High Court and Court of Appeal transcripts between May 1996 and August 1999. Since then we have been restricted to handed down judgments in those two courts. Privy Council and House of Lords judgments go back to 1996. For Scotland, Northern Ireland and Ireland the caselaw usually goes back to 1998 or 1999. In Ireland Supreme Court decisions go back to 1999, High Court decisions to 1996, Irish Information Commissioner's decisions to 1998, and Irish Competition Authority decisions to 1991. Our collections are not yet as comprehensive as we would like.

Our database of statute law follows much the same pattern, although UK statutes go back to 1988, Irish statutory material to 1922, and Northern Ireland statutes to 1495! A few recent Irish Law Reform Commission papers are the harbingers of what may follow.

Where are we going? Some of those who shared our dream three years ago were