Court on Camera
Civitas, 20 May 2011
A true victory for justice was achieved this week, as the UK Supreme Court partnered with Sky to begin broadcasting its hearings online. A live stream is now available via the court’s website, giving all members of the public and press unprecedented access to the workings of our highest court.
The Supreme Court is the only court in the UK to permit cameras, bar a very narrow exception in Scotland, although other countries have long been ahead of us in this field; the Federal Supreme Tribunal in Brazil, for instance, has its own channel, ‘TV Justica’, which offers both recordings of its sessions as well as educational resources about the country’s justice system.
Nonetheless, the drive towards achieving greater transparency and access to our courts has been gathering momentum for some time. The Court has already taken significant strides towards enhanced accessibility, providing an easily digestible press summary alongside each detailed judgement. In addition, exactly two months before the launch of the streaming service, Lord Neuberger, the current Master of the Rolls, delivered a speech to the Judicial Studies Board advocating the importance of public justice: “Providing fair trials in the public eye,” he said, “bolsters public confidence in the administration of justice, and hence in our democratic form of government”.
But greater public access to the courts must go beyond cameras and twitter. Lord Neuberger also highlighted the need for holistic reform in the clarity and accessibility of the law itself. Calling for an end to the “inept drafting” of Acts of Parliament, churned out in an “inexorable volume” in recent years, the head of the Court of Appeal emphasised that the responsibility to ensure the transparency of the law applies to every element of the state and legal profession: “if ignorance of the law is ruled out as an excuse, legislators, judges and lawyers owe a concomitant duty to ensure that the law is not so impenetrable or abstruse that even other lawyers and judges are unable to penetrate it”.
Arguably, this responsibility extends to the media as well. Yet, given the proliferation of increasingly inaccurate, even ludicrous, reporting of high profile cases, it seems that this area requires the most comprehensive reform. All too often, (unelected) judges, in cahoots with excessive human rights, are erroneously blamed for society’s ills. Even if individuals do not use the Court’s records themselves, legal bloggers will. And especially if updates and opinions on cases can be produced online in real time, the service will help to hold the media to account as well.
Nonetheless, there will inevitably be limits; even in the absence of concerns relating to victims and witnesses, it may be inappropriate for the public to see footage from inside the courtroom, or at least to view that footage live. Indeed, both the Court and DPP, Keir Starmer, have insisted that judges are given the discretion to veto streaming in particular cases as they deem fit. It would be self-defeating to achieve greater public access to the courts by sacrificing “the proper administration of justice”.
But will anyone actually watch this new channel? Indeed, cameras had been installed in each of the three courtrooms of the Supreme Court long before this week, and although footage would be provided to broadcasters on request, as Baroness Hale has noted, the media “don’t often ask”.
The importance of this development lies not in the viewing figures, but in the very fact that the service exists at all. Indeed, while the rise of super injunctions may seem antithetical to transparent justice, our instinctive suspicion of these oppressive gagging orders emphasises how “deeply ingrained” our commitment to open justice must be. Regardless of the number of visitors to the site, the launch of the live stream is a milestone in the continuing effort to make justice more transparent.
“Stating that our courts as a general principle are open to all is one thing,” Lord Neuberger argued. But it must be a reality.” At a time when the relationship between the law and the media is constantly in flux and under pressure, the launch is a refreshing reminder of the fundamental principle of our rule of law that, not only must justice be done, but it must be done in public.