Two-Year Pilot Of New Disclosure Rules To Commence 1 January 2019

New rules to govern disclosure of documents in litigation before the English courts were unveiled yesterday, having been approved by the Civil Procedure Rule Committee on 13 July. The rules will be subject to a two-year pilot in the Business and Property Courts which (subject to Ministerial consent) will commence on 1 January 2019. The pilot will be limited to the Business and Property Courts but it is expected that, if it is a success, it will lead to wider reforms to disclosure. The pilot will affect both new and existing proceedings, but it will not affect orders for disclosure made before the commencement date (unless those orders are varied or set aside).

The new rules follow on from proposals published last November by a working group chaired by Lady Justice Gloster (see our summary of the proposals here) which were subject to consultation until the end of February this year. The approved version of the rules is broadly similar to the proposals made