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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions >> Guardian News and Media Ltd, R (on the application of) v City of Westminster Magistrates' Court [2012] EWCA Civ 420 (03 April 2012) URL: https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2012/420.html Cite as: [2013] QB 618, [2012] 3 WLR 1343, [2012] CP Rep 30, [2012] EWCA Civ 420, [2012] 3 All ER 551, [2012] WLR(D) 110, [2012] EMLR 22 |
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CIVIL
DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM QUEENS BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Sullivan LJ and Silber J
CO/7737 and 7272/10
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL |
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B e f o r e :
LORD JUSTICE HOOPER
and
LORD JUSTICE TOULSON
____________________
THE QUEEN ON THE APPLICATION OF GUARDIAN NEWS AND MEDIA LIMITED |
Appellant |
|
- and - |
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CITY OF WESTMINSTER MAGISTRATES' COURT |
Respondents |
____________________
David Perry QC and Melanie Cumberland (instructed by the CPS) for the Interested Party
Heather Rogers QC and Ben Silverstone (instructed by Leigh Day and Co Solicitors) for the Intervener in the Appeal
Hearing date: 7 February 2012
____________________
Crown Copyright ©
Lord Justice Toulson:
Introduction
"Publicity is the very soul of justice. It is the keenest spur to exertion and the surest of all guards against improbity. It keeps the judge himself while trying under trial."
"Open justice is a fundamental tenet of New Zealand's justice system. It requires, as a general rule, that the courts must conduct their business publicly unless this would result in injustice. Open justice is an important safeguard against judicial bias, unfairness and incompetence, ensuring that judges are accountable in the performance of their judicial duties. It maintains public confidence in the impartial administration of justice by ensuring that judicial hearings are subject to public scrutiny, and that "Justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done"."
"…the principle of public access to the Courts is an essential element in our system. Nor are the reasons in the slightest degree difficult to find. The Judges speak and act on behalf of the community. They necessarily exercise great power in order to discharge heavy responsibilities. The fact that they do it under the eyes of their fellow citizens means that they must provide daily and public assurance that so far as they can manage it what they do is done efficiently if possible, with human understanding it may be hoped, but certainly by a fair and balanced application of the law to the facts as they really appear to be. Nor is it simply a matter of providing just answers for individual cases, important though that always will be. It is a matter as well of maintaining a system of justice which requires that the judiciary will be seen day by day attempting to grapple in the same even fashion with the whole generality of cases. To the extent that public confidence is then given in return so may the process may be regarded as fulfilling its purposes."
Facts
1. The opening notes and skeleton arguments submitted on behalf of the US Government and the skeleton arguments submitted on behalf of the defendants.
2. Affidavits submitted by William Stuckwisch, the US senior trial attorney responsible for the conduct of the prosecutions.
3. Other affidavits or witness statements submitted by prosecutors for the US Department of Justice.
4. Correspondence between the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and the US Department of Justice discussing which agency should prosecute the case.
5. Correspondence between solicitors acting for MW Kellogg and counsel for Mr Tesler on the subject of whether MW Kellogg was being prosecuted by the SFO and an accompanying witness statement from the solicitor acting for Mr Tesler, which had been handed up to the judge at the hearing on 28 January 2010.
"Practical problems would arise if the view was taken that the decision I have just outlined is wrong in principle and that members of the press and the public may require as of right to be provided with written copies of documents and exhibits relied upon in the open court proceedings. There are a very large and growing number of extradition cases, many with a high public profile, passing through this Court in a very tight timetable required by the Extradition Act. To whom would any "direction" for the provision of the material be directed? In this case the applicants wish to see affidavits and files of correspondence some of which are provided by the Government, some of which are provided by the defence. In these cases alone the requested documents run to hundreds of pages. The Court itself is provided the papers by the parties in extradition proceedings. Those documents are not usually retained by the Court at the conclusion of the hearing but are forwarded to the Secretary of State, the High Court or returned to the parties as appropriate. The Court has very limited Court staff time and photocopying facilities. The practical problems in producing copies of voluminous correspondence in sufficient time for contemporaneous reporting of the case for any member of the press or the contemporaneous understanding of any member of the public, who required them as of right, whether or not they had attended the Court hearing, would be immense and lead to inevitable delays and public expense.
Open justice requires that criminal proceedings are conducted in open Court with access to the public and the press who may see, hear and report on those proceedings and subject them to proper public scrutiny. That course has been followed in both these cases. I am not granting the application."
The application for judicial review
(a) it had a serious journalistic purpose in seeking production of the documents, because the case raised issues of public interest;
(b) allowing it to see the documents would not frustrate or render impracticable the administration of justice; and
(c) allowing it to see the documents would not interfere with any rights of the parties to the case or of third parties.
(a) What were the two British citizens alleged to have done when participating in the scheme to bribe foreign officials/politicians in Nigeria?
(b) Was the scheme run through London because the UK then had weak laws against overseas corruption?
(c) Why was the US Government, rather that the SFO, seeking to prosecute the two British citizens? Had the SFO taken a back seat so as to allow the US Government to extradite and prosecute them?
(d) Has the UK, by the 2003 Bilateral Extradition Treaty with the USA, made it too easy for the US Government to extradite British citizens, even when the offences alleged were mostly committed in countries other than the USA?
"17. We were unable to attend for all five days as we had other commitments and other stories to report. Given the financial constraints on national newspapers, it is normal for reporters to attend only parts of trials. I believe that reporters should not be penalised if they are not able to attend every day of a trial. Rather than putting obstacles in front of reporters, the justice system, which is supposed to be open for all to see, should assist the media by providing key documents to them once they have been aired in court….
18. Given that Counsel did not refer in detail to the content of documents that were the subject of their submissions, it was simply not possible to understand the full case against Mr Chodan or Mr Tesler from hearing the submissions without access to the documents. The approach adopted by Counsel was, I understand, for the parties' and court's convenience and to make the hearing more efficient. It was possible to do so as copies of the correspondence and documents had been made available to the court and the court was familiar with their contents but without access to these documents my understanding of the proceedings has been hampered."
Decision of the Administrative Court
Criminal Procedure Rules
"1. This rule applies where a member of the public, including a reporter, wants information about a case from the court officer.
2. Such person must –
(a) apply to the court officer;
(b) specify the information requested; and
(c) pay any fee prescribed."
"If the court so directs, the court officer will –
(a) supply to the applicant, by word of mouth, other information about the case; or
(b) allow the applicant to inspect or copy a document, or part of a document, containing information about the case."
The Guardian's appeal
"The application of this principle of open justice has two aspects: as respects proceedings in the court itself it requires that they should be held in open court to which the press and public are admitted and that, in criminal cases at any rate, all evidence communicated to the court is communicated publicly. As respects the publication to a wider public of fair and accurate reports of proceedings that have taken place in court the principle requires that nothing should be done to discourage this."
"Reasonable expedition is, of course, a duty of the judge. But he is also concerned to ensure that justice not only is done but is seen to be done in his court. And this is the fundamental reason for the rule of the common law, recognised by this House in Scott v Scott [1913] AC 417, that trials are to be conducted in public. Lord Shaw of Dunfermline referred with approval, at p 477, to the view of Jeremy Bentham that public trial is needed as a spur to judicial virtue. Whether or not judicial virtue needs such a spur, there is also another important public interest involved in justice done openly, namely, that the evidence and argument should be publicly known, so that society may judge for itself the quality of justice administered in its name, and whether the law requires modification. When public policy in the administration of justice is considered, public knowledge of the evidence and arguments of the parties is certainly as important as expedition: and, if the price of expedition is to be the silent reading by the judge before or at trial of relevant documents, it is arguable that expedition will not always be consistent with justice being seen to be done.
…Justice is done in public so that it may be discussed and criticised in public. Moreover, trials will sometimes expose matters of public interest worthy of discussion other than the judicial task of doing justice between the parties in the particular case."
"Since the date when Lord Scarman expressed doubt in Home Office v Harman as to whether expedition would always be consistent with open justice, the practices of counsel preparing skeleton arguments, chronologies and reading guides, and judges pre-reading documents (including witness statements) out of court, have become much more common. These methods of saving time in court are now not merely permitted, but are positively required, by practice directions. The result is that a case may be heard in such a way that even an intelligent and well-informed member of the public, present throughout every hearing in open court, would be unable to obtain a full understanding of the documentary evidence and the arguments on which the case was to be decided.
In such circumstances there may be some degree of unreality in the proposition that the material documents in the case have (in practice as well as in theory) passed into the public domain. That is a matter which gives rise to concern…
As the court's practice develops it will be necessary to give appropriate weight to both efficiency and openness of justice, with Lord Scarman's warning in mind. Public access to documents referred to in open court (but not in fact read aloud and comprehensively in open court) may be necessary, with suitable safeguards, to avoid too wide a gap between what has in theory, and what has in practice, passed into the public domain."
"If, as in the instant case, an opening speech is dispensed with in favour of a written opening (or a skeleton argument treated as such) which is not read out, or even summarised, in open court before the calling of the evidence, it seems to me impossible to avoid the conclusion that an important part of the judicial process, namely the instruction of the judge in the issues of the case, has in fact taken place in the privacy of his room and not in open court. In such a case I have no doubt that, on an application from a member of the press or public in the course of the trial, it is within the inherent jurisdiction of the court to require that there be made available to such applicant a copy of the written opening or skeleton argument submitted to the judge."
"Subject to questions arising in connection with written submissions on PII applications, or any other express justification for non-disclosure on the basis that the written submissions would not properly have been deployed in open court, we have concluded that the principle of open justice leads inexorably to the conclusion that written skeleton arguments, or those parts of the skeleton arguments adopted by counsel and treated by the court as forming part of his oral submissions, should be disclosed if and when a request to do so is received."
"When evidence is given orally, all in court hear what is said. When evidence is produced it may or may not be read out. …The members of the public in court have no right to claim to be allowed to look at the exhibits."
"As judges have differed as to how judicial discretion should be exercised in this class of case it may be helpful if we give some guidance…It seems to us that, normally when a film is being shown to a jury and the judge, in the exercise of his discretion, decides that it should be done in a closed court room or in a cinema, he should allow representatives of the press to be present. No harm can be done by doing so: some good may result."
Article 10
"Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers…"
"The Court observes that the right to freedom to receive information basically prohibits a Government from restricting a person from receiving information that others wish or may be willing to impart to him. Article 10 does not, in circumstances such as those in the present case, confer on the individual a right of access to a register containing information on his personal position, nor does it embody an obligation on the Government to impart such information to the individual. "
"The Commission considers however that the general principles stated by the Court may not apply with the same force in the context of court proceedings…
In order that the media may perform their function of imparting information there is a need that they should be accurately informed.
Assuming that the decision of the court to hold part of the proceedings in camera constituted an interference with the applicants' right to receive and impart information as guaranteed by article 10 para 1 of the Convention, the Commission must consider whether this interference was prescribed by law and whether it was necessary in a democratic society for one or more of the purposes set out in article 10 para 2 of the Convention."
"It notes that the circumstances in the present case are to be clearly distinguished from those in cases relating to restrictions upon the freedom of the Press in which it has on many occasions recognised the existence of a right for the public to receive information…The Court considers that article 10 of the Convention should not be interpreted as guaranteeing the absolute right to have access to all the technical details relating to the construction of a power station as, unlike information concerning its environmental impact, such data should not be of general public interest."
"26. The court has consistently recognised that the public has a right to receive information of general interest. Its case law in this field has been developed in relation to press freedom which serves to impart information and ideas on such matters. In this connection, the most careful scrutiny on the part of the Court is called for when the measures taken by the national authority are capable of discouraging the participation of the press, one of society's "watchdogs", in the public debate on matters of legitimate public concern, even measures which merely make access to information more cumbersome.
27. In view of the interest protected by article 10, the law cannot allow arbitrary restrictions which may become a form of indirect censorship should the authorities create obstacles to the gathering of information. For example, the latter activity is an essential preparatory step in journalism and is an inherent, protected part of press freedom. The function of the press includes the creation of forums for public debate. However, the realisation of this function is not limited to the media or professional journalists. In the present case, the preparation of the forum of public debate was conducted by a non-governmental organisation. The purpose of the applicant's activities can therefore be said to have been an essential element of informed public debate. …
28. …the Court finds that the applicant was involved in the legitimate gathering of information on a matter of public importance. It observes that the authorities interfered in the preparatory stage of this process by creating an administrative obstacle. The Constitutional Court's monopoly of information thus amounted to a form of censorship. Furthermore, given that the applicant's intention was to impart to the public the information gathered from the constitutional complaint in question, and thereby to contribute to the public debate concerning legislation on drug-related offences, its right to impart information was clearly impaired."
"Nevertheless, the Court has recently advanced towards a broader interpretation of the notion of "freedom to receive information" and thereby towards the recognition of a right of access to information."
"…moreover, the state's obligations in matters of freedom of the press include the elimination of barriers to the exercise of press functions where, in issues of public interest, such barriers exist solely because of an information monopoly held by the authorities. The Court notes at this juncture that the information sought by the applicant in the present case was ready and available and it did not require the collection of any data by the Government. Therefore, the court considers that the State had an obligation not to impede the flow of information sought by the applicant."
"The Court emphasises that access to original documentary sources for legitimate historical research was an essential element in the exercise of the applicant's right to freedom of expression (see Tarsasag v Hungary)."
Other countries
"Even before the Charter, access to exhibits that were used to make a judicial determination, even ones introduced in the course of pre-trial proceedings and not at trial, was a well-recognised aspect of the open court principle."
She cited the judgment of Dickson J for the majority of the Supreme Court in Attorney General of Nova Scotia v MacIntyre [1982] 1 SCR 175.
"It is, of course, true that Scott v Scott and MacPherson v MacPherson were cases in which proceedings had reached the stage of trial whereas the issuance of a search warrant takes place at the pre-trial investigative stage. The cases mentioned, however, and many others which could be cited, establish the broad principle of "openness" in judicial proceedings, whatever their nature, and in the exercise of judicial powers. The same policy considerations upon which is predicated our reluctance to inhibit accessibility at the trial stage are still present and should be addressed at the pre-trial stage…
At every stage the rule should be one of public accessibility and concomitant judicial accountability…
In my view, curtailment of public accessibility can only be justified where there is present the need to protect social values of superordinate importance. One of these is the protection of the innocent."
"71. The public have a legitimate interest in being informed about the whole course of the investigation and the trials in relation to the death of Ms Sheffield. Two people have been charged and ultimately neither has been found guilty. The Court of Appeal differed from the High Court over whether the videotape should be admitted in evidence. The conduct of the police in setting up the reconstruction in circumstances which led to its being declared inadmissible is also a justified subject of public scrutiny, as is whether the Court of Appeal was correct in reversing the High Court.
72. It was said in argument that the public did not need to see the videotape when they already had the judgments of Cooper J and the Court of Appeal explaining their differing conclusions as to whether the videotape should be admitted. I do not consider that that argument carries much weight. In the first place the showing of the videotape is what is important for a visual medium like a television. In the second I do not consider that legitimate public debate about the admissibility ruling and the circumstances of the case generally can take place effectively without the public being fully informed by access to the video itself. I say that because the public are entitled to be satisfied that the courts have, in their judgments, fairly portrayed the substance of what Mr Rogers said and did during the videotaped reconstruction. The public are also entitled to assess for themselves whether the law generally and its application to this case strike the right balance between vindicating breaches of the Bill of Rights Act and the effective prosecution of crime. I am not expressing any view about that issue myself. I am simply pointing out that this is a matter of legitimate public interest and unless the videotape is released the public will be less than fully informed. Only if the case for withholding the material in question is of sufficient strength should the public have to consider the matter on a less than fully informed basis.
…
74. One final point should be mentioned. The courts must be careful in cases such as the present lest, by denying access to their records, they give the impression they are seeking to prevent public scrutiny of their processes and what has happened in a particular case. Any public perception that the courts were adopting a defensive attitude by limiting or preventing access to court records would tend to undermine confidence in the judicial system. There will of course be cases when a sufficient reason for withholding information is made out. If that is so, the public will or should understand why access has been denied. But unless the case for denial is clear, individual interests must give way to the public interest in maintaining confidence in the administration of justice through the principle of openness."
"122. The media was, of course, able to fully report everything that happened at Mr Rogers' trial. The unusual feature of the preset case, however, is that the video tape of the reconstruction of events at Mangonui, part of which TVNZ wishes to broadcast, did not form part of the evidence at the trial. This is because the Court of Appeal decided that there was a breach of Mr Rogers' protected rights and that the interests of justice required that the tape not be shown to the jury. This raises the question whether the requirements of open justice, in relation to scrutiny of judicial processes and also police actions in this case, will not be satisfied unless the videotape is made available, in effect, for public broadcasting.
…
136. In the end, in the circumstances of this difficult case, I have reached the conclusion, when balancing the conflicts of interest, that the side of open justice carries the greatest weight. Preservation of public confidence in the legal system is directly relevant, because of the circumstances and outcomes of the trials of the two accused persons. There is a real risk of damage to public faith in the criminal justice system if the circumstances that led the Court of Appeal to refuse to admit the evidence are not fully transparent. It is a less than satisfactory response to reason that the end is achieved because the courts' own descriptions of the events that are depicted in the videotape are full and complete. Open justice strongly supports allowing the media access to primary sources of relevant information rather than having to receive it filtered according to what the courts see as relevant. On the other side of the scales, Mr Rogers' rights have been breached but also vindicated during the criminal justice process. At this stage they have mush less weight."
"I agree that the underlying issues can be debated without the videotape being shown on national television. But experience shows that arguments are usually more easily understood where they are contextualised. An esoteric argument about the way the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act is applied by the Courts becomes far more accessible to the public if the implications can be assessed by reference to the concrete facts of a particular case. In that context, to prohibit the proposed broadcast of the videotape of the confession and reconstruction would necessarily have the tendency to limit legitimate public discussion on questions of genuine public interest."
"From the right to open justice flows the media's right to gain access to, observe and report on, the administration of justice and the right to have access to papers and written arguments which are an integral part of court proceedings subject to such limitations as may be warranted on a case-by-case basis in order to ensure a fair trial."
"On the contrary, in fact-specific matters such as these, undue technicism, whether on questions of procedure or evidence, would be more likely to distort the achievement of constitutional justice than to enhance it. Similarly, it seems clear that, whereas in most cases involving proportionality, the courts will act as an outside eye in assessing the constitutionality of the way in which power has been exercised, in cases such as the present the courts will have to do the balancing themselves. Check-lists will not be helpful. As in all proportionality exercises, the factual matrix will be all-important, and the court concerned will itself have to make an order based on its enquiry into the specific way in which constitutionally-protected interests interact with each other, and particularly with the intensity of their engagement."
"The difficulty in defining the weight to be given the presumption of access flows from the purpose underlining the presumption and the broad variety of documents deemed to be judicial. The presumption of access is based on the need for federal courts, although independent – indeed, particularly because they are independent – to have a measure of accountability and for the public to have confidence in the administration of justice. Federal courts exercise powers under Article III that impact upon virtually all citizens…Monitoring both provides judges with critical views of their work and deters arbitrary judicial behaviour…Such monitoring is not possible without access to testimony and documents that are used in the performance of Article III functions."
Counter-arguments
1. The open justice principle is ordinarily satisfied if:
(a) proceedings are held in public; and
(b) fair, accurate and contemporaneous media reporting of the proceedings is not prevented by any action of the court.
2. The Tesler and Chodan extradition hearings satisfied those requirements.
3. The court had no inherent jurisdiction empowering it to allow the Guardian's request.
4. The true position at common law was as stated in Waterfield.
5. The observations of Judge LJ in Howell were limited to the provision of skeleton arguments in the Court of Appeal in circumstances where the words written were treated as if they had been deployed in open court. The case had no wider significance.
6. In written submissions on behalf of the US Government it was argued that a power to allow the Guardian's application was now conferred by rule 5.8 of the Criminal Procedure Rules 2011. Those rules had not been in force at the relevant time but they made the Guardian's appeal academic. In his oral submissions Mr Perry took a different position. He submitted that rule 5.8 was to be narrowly construed and would not include the Guardian's request.
7. The Administrative Court was right to take into account the existence of the exemption in section 32 of the Freedom of Information Act. It was significant that Parliament had expressly exempted public authorities, which would include a court, from any obligation under the Act to produce a document placed in the custody of the court for the purposes of proceedings in a particular cause or matter.
8. Article 10 was not engaged in this case. The Leander principle applied, and the later cases relied on by the Guardian did not support its case. In Tarsasag all that was sought was access to the complaint which had been made to the court. In the present case the nature of the extradition application was plain and the Guardian's request was for access to a much wider range of documents than in Tarsasag. Further, in Tarsasag the applicability of article 10 had not been a contested issue. The question in that case was whether the Government had a defence under article 10.2. In A v Independent News and Media the issue was whether the press should be allowed to be present at a court hearing. In the present case the extradition hearings had been held in open court.
9. The District Judge's comments about the problems which would arise if her view of the law was wrong were important practical considerations.
10. In any event, the appeal ought to be dismissed on the facts. The extradition hearings had been full and lengthy. The issue had not been whether the US Government had produced sufficient evidence to justify putting the defendants on trial. The scheme under the Extradition Act 2003 prohibits an inquiry by the court considering extradition into the sufficiency of the evidence to be relied upon at trial. The issues in the extradition hearings were confined to whether the US Government had satisfied the formal requirements of Part 2 of the Act. The judge had delivered clear and full judgments explaining why the requirements were satisfied. Since it appeared from the Guardian's evidence that its correspondents had not attended the full hearings it was unsurprising if they found themselves unable fully to follow the arguments, but that was not through any want of open justice. If the Guardian regarded the cases as raising matters of great importance, it would be reasonable to expect it to have committed more resources to following it.
Conclusions
"There seem to be good reasons for non-disclosure to the public of sensitive, personal information in family law and mental health and disability cases. In both instances, the need to protect personal information from painful and humiliating disclosure may found an exception to the open justice principle. The rationale for protecting such information, especially relating to vulnerable people like children, battered spouses, the mentally disabled, or the elderly and infirm, where there seems no obvious public-interest reason in publicity, still holds."
Lord Justice Hooper:
"If the court so directs, the court officer will—
(a) supply to the applicant, by word of mouth, other information about the case; or
(b) allow the applicant to inspect or copy a document, or part of a document, containing information about the case."
"The supply of information about a case is affected by—
(a) Articles 6, 8 and 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, and the court's duty to have regard to the importance of—
(i) dealing with criminal cases in public, and
(ii) allowing a public hearing to be reported to the public;
(b) the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974;
(c) section 18 of the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996;
(d) the Sexual Offences (Protected Material) Act 1997;
(e) the Data Protection Act 1998;
(f) section 20 of the Access to Justice Act 1999; and
(g) reporting restrictions, rules about which are contained in Part 16 (Reporting, etc. restrictions)."
"43. As a matter of basic principle the starting point should be that practices adopted by the courts and parties to ensure the efficient resolution of litigation should not be allowed to adversely affect the ability of the public to know what is happening in the course of the proceedings."
"2. Media Access to Prosecution Materials
The aim of the CPS is to ensure that the principle of open justice is maintained - that justice is done and seen to be done - while at the same time balancing the rights of defendants to a fair trial with any likely consequences for victims or their families and witnesses occasioned by the release of prosecution material to the media.
Prosecution material which has been relied upon by the Crown in court and which should normally be released to the media, includes:
Maps/photographs (including custody photos of defendants)/diagrams and other documents produced in court;
Videos showing scenes of crime as recorded by police after the event;
Videos of property seized (e.g. weapons, clothing as shown to jury in court, drug hauls or stolen goods);
Sections of transcripts of interviews/statements as read out (and therefore reportable, subject to any orders) in court;
Videos or photographs showing reconstructions of the crime;
CCTV footage of the defendant, subject to any copyright issues.
Prosecution material which may be released after consideration by the Crown Prosecution Service in consultation with the police and relevant victims, witnesses and family members includes:
CCTV footage or photographs showing the defendant and victim, or the victim alone, that has been viewed by jury and public in court, subject to any copyright issues;
Video and audio tapes of police interviews with defendants, victims and witnesses;
Victim and witness statements.
Where a guilty plea is accepted and the case does not proceed to trial, then all the foregoing principles apply. But to ensure that only material informing the decision of the court is published, material released to the media must reflect the prosecution case and must have been read out, or shown in open court, or placed before the sentencing judge." (Emphasis added)
"I do not propose to express a view on the further points which arose in Mahon v. Rahn [1998] QB 424, namely whether the [implied] undertaking applies also to used materials and whether it survives the publication of the statement in open court"
68. In this Part "criminal court" means—
(a) the criminal division of the Court of Appeal;
(b) when dealing with any criminal cause or matter—
(i) the Crown Court;
(ii) a magistrates' court.
69. (1) There are to be rules of court (to be called "Criminal Procedure Rules") governing the practice and procedure to be followed in the criminal courts.
(2) Criminal Procedure Rules are to be made by a committee known as the Criminal Procedure Rule Committee.
(3) The power to make Criminal Procedure Rules includes power to make different provision for different cases or different areas, including different provision—
(a) for a specified court or description of courts, or
(b) for specified descriptions of proceedings or a specified jurisdiction.
(4) Any power to make . . . Criminal Procedure Rules is to be exercised with a view to securing that—
(a) the criminal justice system is accessible, fair and efficient, and
(b) the rules are both simple and simply expressed.
The Master of the Rolls:
i. I would leave open the question whether, if the court would not otherwise have power to make the order sought by the appellant, it would have such power by virtue of Rule 5.8. Not only is it unnecessary to decide the point, but it was not argued before us, unsurprisingly as the rule was not in existence at the time the District Judge made her order.
ii. I agree with what is said in para 106 that 'criminal cause or matter' in section 68(b) of the Courts Act 2003 does not necessarily have the same meaning as the identical expression in section 18(1) of the Senior Courts Act 1981, and that, if the expression in the 1981 Act has the meaning ascribed to it in the earlier decision in this case, [2011]EWCA
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Civ 1188, then it has a different meaning in the 2003 Act. In particular, it would be inappropriate for the expression to be accorded a narrow meaning in the 2003 Act.
iii. I also agree that 'a document ….containing information about the case' in Rule 5.8(7)(b) includes written statements made by witnesses, and any exhibits: to exclude them would involve giving the words an artificially and inappropriately narrow meaning.
Note 1 http://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/agencies/mediaprotocol.html#a02 [Back]