Cameras should be allowed in courts in England and Wales but filming must not lead to the birth of primetime TV trials, a poll of top lawyers suggested today.
In a survey of the Times Law 100 Panel, which comprises legal experts working across a number of fields, 68 per cent backed the Government’s decision to allow sentencing to be televised in some courts – although many cautioned that filming should go no further than this.
Some 21 per cent said that cameras should not be allowed in court, with 11 per cent undecided.
Vanessa Barnett, partner at Charles Russell, said: “Although the initial plans are limited, the temptation over time to film more and more of the process will be strong.
“We must be careful what we create here: filming for public understanding has value, but we must resist the pull towards sensationalist display of full trials. Key moral and judicial concepts like ‘innocent until proven guilty’ may quietly slip into the Bermuda Triangle, never to be found again.”
Many of the panel who voted in favour of televised sentencing cited the need for justice to be done in public.
Julian Pike, a partner at Farrer & Co, said that there is “a genuine public interest” in improving the public’s understanding of sentencing. “It should also assist a more informed public debate of the UK’s current sentencing policies,” he said.
Jonathan Caplan, a barrister at 5 Paper Buildings, who chaired a Bar Council committee looking at the desirability of televising courts in the UK more than 20 years ago, said that televising sentencing “would enhance confidence in our justice system and help people to understand how important decisions that affect all our lives are made”. His committee concluded at the time that televising many courts, subject to strict rules of coverage and subject to the overriding discretion of the judge, was desirable.
Panel members who dissented with the Government’s decision warned of a potential decline into primetime farce and suggested that the Government will not achieve its aim of educating the public.
Michael Gouriet, a partner at Withers, said there is a “slippery slope to participants losing anonymity and becoming celebrities,” while Martyn Gowar, a partner at McDermott Will & Emery, said he has “grave misgivings about turning the courts into a soap opera. It is not satisfactory to focus on the judge’s summary remarks as they are only a part of what goes to make up a trial.”
Ronnie Fox, principal at Fox Solicitors, said that public understanding of the legal system “will not be advanced one jot by allowing cameras into court rooms on a very restricted basis”. He added that “either the whole trial should be broadcast – which would serve the most prurient interests – or, preferably, nothing at all.”
Edward Sparrow, a partner at Ashurst, said that for most people, watching a judge give judgment “will (a) not be interesting TV and (b) will be incomprehensible”.
Robin Fry, a partner at Beachcroft, said that judges appearing on television must be wigged and gowned because “his or her decision is one of the Crown and should not be seen as individual caprice.”
