Kate Molan & Lucy Cummin warn against increasing transparency in the family courts
In the summer of 2014, Sir James Munby, President of the Family Division issued what many practitioners considered to be a radical consultation paper. The aim was to understand whether there is a need for the family courts to become more transparent as a way of improving public confidence in a much criticised system.
The president was firm that at every stage of the reform process there must be a clear consultation with those that might be affected and the paper invited views on four main issues:
1 Publication of judgments
The President wished to understand the impact of the new Practice Guidance, Transparency in the Family Courts—Publication of Judgments , since which there has been a huge increase in the number of judgments published on BAILLI in an attempt to demonstrate the careful decision-making process in family cases. However, much of the published material fails to make new law and leaves family lawyers, commentators and academics with a monumental task of sifting through the material.
