"1. Permission, pursuant to CPR 2.7(4), CPR 29.3 and the [Covid-19] Emergency Measures [Practice Direction], that:
a. the trial of these proceedings shall be conducted wholly as a remote video hearing in accordance with the provisions of the Emergency Measures PD, subject to any further order or direction of the Court.
b. the technology platform to be used for this purpose shall be Zoom Business video conference, operated by the International Dispute Resolution Centre in London.
2. In addition, the parties have permission pursuant to paragraph 10.2 of the Emergency Measures PD to arrange a live transcript of the trial listed to be heard on 27-31 July 2020.
3. The live note operators are permitted along with providing remote access to real-time transcripts to record the proceedings and provide an electronic presentation of evidence."
"3(1) Notes of evidence or a record of the proceedings in a Court may be taken down or recorded mechanically or by any other means, where a Judge, Magistrate or other person presiding over a Court, is required by law to
(a) take down notes of evidence; or
(b) cause notes of evidence to be taken down; or
(c) make a record of the proceedings.(2) The notes of evidence or record of proceedings taken down or recorded in accordance with subsection (1) shall be the official record of the Court.
4. The Registrar or Clerk of the Court shall cause a transcript, of the notes of evidence or record of proceedings taken down or recorded in accordance with section 3(1), to be prepared as soon as practicable after the close of proceedings each day.
5. A transcript prepared in accordance with section 4 shall be verified by a certificate of the person responsible for the accuracy of the taking or recording of the evidence or proceedings and the transcript."
Section 7 provides for the making of the official transcript under section 4 and its verification under section 5 by the Court Reporters (although this expression is not used in the Act).
"16 The common law has long upheld the principle that open justice is central to the rule of law. It has been repeated on many occasions at the highest level. Scott v Scott6 is often cited as the founding modern authority where Lord Halsbury said, at p 440: 'I am of opinion that every court of justice is open to every subject of the King'. An important aspect of the principle is that justice must be administered in public. The general rule is that the public and representatives of the media have the right to attend court hearings. The importance of the presence of the media is that they may report what occurs. Open justice helps to keep all those involved in the process up to the mark. It ensures public scrutiny of what is being done in the courts and assists in maintaining public confidence in the administration of justice. It also reduces the risk of inaccurate and ill-informed comment on court proceedings.
17 This aspect of the principle of open justice may be curtailed in limited circumstances, generally dictated by Statute or Rules of Court... The important corollary of open justice, namely that what has been said and has happened in court may be freely reported and discussed outside court, is also subject to carefully controlled restrictions.
...
22 It is court staff who generally have direct dealings with members of the public attending court and who are regularly asked by them about the appropriate way to behave. It is the staff in the first instance who must be vigilant about the use of cameras, mobile phones and the like. Many members of the public who attend court are on unfamiliar territory, are nervous and seek help from court staff. To assist them in the discharge of their functions, Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service ('HMCTS') has produced guidance for its criminal court staff which includes a section entitled 'Note taking in the public gallery of criminal courts'. It does not have authoritative legal status but reflects the understanding of HMCTS of the correct position.
'It is accepted that justice is administered in open court where anyone present may listen to and report what is said. There can be no objection to note taking in the public gallery unless it is done for a wrongful purpose; for example to brief a witness who is not in court on what has already happened. This may occur in the Crown Court, where witnesses who have yet to give evidence are usually kept out of court and in civil cases where a judge has directed that a future witness should be out of court while other evidence is being given, or the hearing is in chambers. Court staff need to be alert, but it is not for them to prohibit the practice. Courts should not place notices in the court building forbidding note taking. If any member of the court staff sees a member of the public taking notes and there is some reason to suspect it might be for an improper purpose, he or she should report the matter to the clerk of the court (or to the judge...) and ask for directions. The clerk should, if possible, make inquiries of the member of the public concerned or direct an usher to do so. If the result of the inquiry does not allay suspicion, the matter must then be reported to the judge.'
23 In my judgment this guidance is correct in identifying the default position as being that those who attend public court hearings should be free to make notes of what occurs. It is a feature of the principle of open justice that those attending public hearings should ordinarily be able to make notes of what occurs. For any number of reasons a visitor to a court may wish to have a record of the proceedings for later use or out of interest. In this jurisdiction there is no good reason why the starting point should be that note-taking is not allowed unless permission has been sought and granted. Note-taking by members of the public is unlikely, without more, to interfere with the due administration of justice. The reasons for a distinction being drawn between ordinary members of the public and journalists and legal commentators in connection with live text-based communications... do not apply to ordinary note-taking.
24 The default position is subject to the control of the court which, for good reason, may withdraw the liberty to make notes. The paramount question for the judge if considering withdrawing that liberty would be whether the note-taking in question would be likely to interfere with the proper administration of justice."
"makes provision for the taking of an official transcript for a fee of proceedings, if I can summarise it. It does not, on the fact of it, preclude the use of live note taking. And, indeed, it is an open Court matter. So if a member of the public were to want to come and sit in the courtroom and take their note of it, then they would be entitled to do so, of course, but it is not for publication.
And since this live note seems to be purely as an aide-memoire for the parties and their lawyers in the matter, from my very limited consideration of the legal issue, I do not see that it impinges upon the monopoly of the Court Reporting Unit to provide an official transcript of the proceedings, nor does it impinge upon their entitlement to charge a fee for that service.
What [it is], is not a transcript of proceedings, it is a note of proceedings that the parties can refer to for their own use. And hence, subject to any further submissions that might be made and further consideration that the Court might in due course have to give to this type of request, I see no difficulty with it."
"10.1 At any hearing of the Court, the proceedings will be recorded by the court by such recording equipment as approved by the Chief Justice.
10.2 No party or member of the public may use unofficial recording equipment at any hearing or in any court or judge's chambers without the prior authorization of the presiding judge.
10.3 The court recording, whether in written, audio or other digital form, shall be the official transcript of the proceedings."
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