CIPIL Seminar: 'Of data and judges: the conundrum of public access to information from the court'

Speaker

Dr Judith Townend, Lecturer in Media and Information Law, University of Sussex

Abstract

If a survey were commissioned on public understanding of English law, the court's approach to open justice would surely rank highly as one of its best-known principles. That courts should be open and publicly accountable is a sentiment reinforced daily through newspaper reports and television dramas. It is defended vigorously by the national and local press, although some studies suggest traditional court reporting is declining in volume and scope. How open justice is achieved in practice is less well-understood. The approach that different courts and tribunals take varies radically; and there is variety even within one category of court type. The transition to digital communication of courts and tribunals activity has happened inconsistently over time, with limited centralised implementation of strategy and control and shaped by dominant commercial interests. As a result, important issues such as the competing interests in data have been neglected; for example, the friction between individuals' privacy, data protection and rehabilitation rights, on the one hand, and the media and public's right to freedom of expression and open justice, on the other. This seminar will confront these frictions directly: questioning both the doctrinal and practical response to open justice in the 21st century digital environment and asking pressing questions of the ongoing £1billion programme of courts reform at Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS). It is intended to be of interest to any researcher or student curious about how the court is accessed in theory and practice, and especially to those working on topics of technological reform in a legal and regulatory context.

About the speaker

Dr Judith Townend is lecturer in media and information law at the University of Sussex, where she specialises in research relating to freedom of expression and access to information. She has been preoccupied by courts data since 2011 and has written for a wide range of media and academic publications. Prior to joining Sussex in 2016, she was lecturer and director of the Information Law and Policy Centre at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies. Her route into socio-legal research was relatively unorthodox, having studied Archaeology & Anthropology at the University of Cambridge as an undergraduate before training and working in journalism at the beginning of her career. Her doctoral studies at City University's Centre for Law, Justice and Journalism focused on the so-called 'chilling effect' phenomenon in the context of defamation and privacy law.

For further information please contact CIPIL Administrator, Mr. James Parish jprp2@cam.ac.uk