Remote Hearings: What Worked And What Didn't

Marks & Clerk Law recently participated in the first ever fully remote hearing in the Court of Appeal. We want to share what worked well (and what didn't) in the hope that others in the legal profession can be better prepared and those in a position facing an upcoming hearing can be assured, the courts are still open for business.

Lesson 1: Bundles

The Court of Appeal ordinarily works from hard-copy documents and the rules on bundles are rigid. All documents must be single-sided and the requirement for continuous pagination often means that the bundles used at the High Court need to be replaced just for the sake of page numbers (these rules will no doubt make the environmentally conscious wince). It was immediately clear that producing and delivering hard-copy bundles to the judges and other parties would not be possible.