Sir Geoffrey Vos, Master of the Rolls, giving the main judgment, promised tough action on future breaches, while acknowledging that mistakes happen, in R (on the application of the Counsel General for Wales) v Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy [2022] EWCA Civ 181, All ER (D) 79 (Feb).
The draft judgment in the case was sent by the judge’s clerk to counsel’s clerks at Matrix Chambers, with the statement that the draft was confidential and disclosure may be treated as contempt of court. However, a Matrix press release was uploaded too early, appearing on the chambers’ website, LinkedIn and Twitter. It was taken down as soon as the error was discovered and the senior practice manager at Matrix alerted the judge to the mistake, which she said occurred due to a ‘miscommunication’ within chambers.
Sir Geoffrey said: ‘I should say that I have called this case into court because, amongst other reasons, the breaches that occurred here are not alone.
‘I have become aware formally and informally of other breaches in other cases. It seems, anecdotally at least, that violations of the embargo on publicising either the content or the substance of draft judgments are becoming more frequent.
‘The purpose of this judgment is not to castigate those whose inadvertent oversights gave rise to the breaches in this case, but to send a clear message to all those who receive embargoed judgments in advance of hand-down that the embargo must be respected. In future, those who break embargoes can expect to find themselves the subject of contempt proceedings as paragraph 2.8 of CPR PD40E envisages.’
Concluding, he said it was not appropriate for persons in the clerks’ rooms or offices of chambers to see the draft judgment or be given a summary of its contents, and drafting press releases was not a legitimate activity to undertake within the embargo. He suggested one named clerk provide the link between the court and the barristers, and that chambers and solicitors put ‘proper precautions and double-checks’ in place to catch errors in time.
