Guidance On Redaction (of Disclosed Documents) Under CPR PD 51U

Key takeaways:

• This case is an important reminder that, while parties giving disclosure have the ability to redact irrelevant confidential information, the test for relevance should not be limited to whether the information is relevant in accordance with the issues for disclosure. The question of whether the information is “irrelevant to any issue in the proceedings” is a broader test.
• While the court identifies the need for proportionality in conducting a search for relevant documents, once a document has been identified for disclosure, different considerations apply to whether there are justifiable grounds to apply redactions.
• The court may adopt greater vigilance where documents are heavily redacted to ensure that there is a proper basis to apply redactions. Parties should therefore think carefully about applying broad redactions to “unrelated commercial transactions and other commercial information” in circumstances where evidence of the wider commercial