Supreme court puts archive of recordings of past cases online
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Version 0 of 1. The supreme court is to make recordings of past cases available online as a free video archive. The final court of appeal in the UK has led the way in televising court hearings, although until now it has broadcast only live hearings. But from Tuesday, lawyers, law students and those eager to learn more about specific cases will be able to indulge their interests through what has been called “court catchup”. The video-on-demand service is intended to make an archive of cases available for up to a year. It will cover not only supreme court hearings but also those in the judicial committee of the privy council (JCPC), which sits in the same Westminster building and hears appeals from some Commonwealth countries, British overseas territories and crown dependencies. Occasionally the JCPC hears death penalty cases. Eventually the archive is expected to hold as many as 150 courtroom hearings and 900 hours of recordings at any one time. The supreme court hopes the initiative, as well as providing an educational resource, may save legal costs by cutting down on the need to produce transcripts of cases so frequently. “Now justice can be seen to be done at a time which suits you,” said Lord Neuberger, the president of the supreme court. “The archive will help people see the background to decisions made in our highest appeal court. It will also be useful to the legal profession and serve as an informative tool for those considering a career in the law.” Footage of the proceedings in court will be freely available via each case’s page on the supreme court website and will be uploaded the next working day. Once judgment is delivered, footage of the justices’ summary in court will be published alongside the full judgment text and press summary. For copyright reasons, users will not be able to download the footage for long-term storage or editing. About 15,000 people a month have used the court’s live streaming service to watch cases since it was launched in October 2014. The new service will be funded by the supreme court until March 2016, when “it will be reviewed in light of user feedback and the court’s other spending priorities”. |