Reporting Restrictions On Court Proceedings

Two recent cases confirm that reporting restrictions on court proceedings will only be imposed as a measure of last resort.

In line with the core principle of open justice, the general rule is that justice should be administered in public: proceedings must be held in public, evidence must be communicated publicly, and the Court should not prevent the fair, accurate and contemporaneous reporting of proceedings by the media unless strictly necessary. As to reporting, there are important statutory (automatic) restrictions; for example, victims of a wide range of sexual offences have lifetime anonymity under the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1992. The Court can also impose a discretionary reporting restriction, including under section 4(2) of the Contempt of Court Act 1981, which allows for the postponement of reporting in order to avoid a substantial risk of prejudice to the administration of justice. The onus is on the party seeking the restriction to show that a