The recent news that ministers have tabled draft legislation that would allow sentencing remarks from judges to be broadcast within two months has met with a mixed reception. The Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales said that the proposal to broadcast sentencing remarks was ‘well overdue’ and the Lord Chief Justice has also given an enthusiastic ‘thumbs up’ to the measure. Despite this, the Bar Council seem sceptical about the measure, warning that the move could turn sentencing into a ‘spectator sport’ and fretting that we must ‘guard against unwarranted attacks on judges where the sentence isn’t popular with the public’.
The Crown Court (Recording and Broadcasting) Order 2020 was laid in Parliament on 15 January and provides for cameras to broadcast the sentencing remarks by High Court and senior circuit judges in the Old Bailey and other high profile crown courts across the country and is a development of access given to the Court of Appeal in 2013, where three major broadcasters can apply to film judges delivering judgments, as well
