SCOTLAND Law and Practice Contributed by: Ciara Wilson, Gillian Crandles and Lauren McDonach, Turcan Connell
to attend and report on cases. That said, the general principle can be departed from where an order restricting reporting is made, which is particularly common in child law cases. Where proceedings involve a child, it is open to solicitors to move the court in terms of Section 46(1) of the Children and Young Persons (Scot - land) Act 1937 to make an order that the child or children must not be capable of being identified in newspaper reports. As per financial proceedings (see 2.8 Media Access and Transparency ), no such order is required in respect of a child concerned in exclu - sion order proceedings by virtue of Section 44 of the Children Scotland Act 1995. Likewise, Sec - tion 182 of the Children’s Hearings (Scotland) Act 2011 makes provision for a child involved in a children’s hearing or other proceedings under the Act. In both cases, the relevant sections simply provide that any publication that could identify such a child is prohibited. Similarly, adoption and permanence proceed - ings are heard and determined in private in accordance with Section 109 of the Adoption and Children (Scotland) Act 2007, unless the court decides otherwise. Where the relevant reporting restrictions do not automatically apply by operation of statute (as
set out earlier), parties may prevail upon the court’s general discretion in terms of the Con - tempt of Court Act 1981 – Section 11 of which empowers the court to prohibit publication of a name or a matter in connection with the pro - ceedings. Any such order must, however, be sent to any interested person, which will include the press, and must be published on the Scot - tish Courts and Tribunals website. This may have the unintended consequence of drawing their attention to an action that might have otherwise Prior to the publication of a judicial opinion, there exists the opportunity for a sheriff or judge to anonymise an opinion – for example, by using initials instead of a person’s name. This com - monly happens in family law judgments, particu - larly in cases involving a child. proceeded unnoticed. Anonymising the Child The effect of such a step is not the same as an order restricting reporting. The media will still be able to report the proceedings (unless the media is prohibited because an order in terms of Section 46(1) of the Children and Young Persons (Scotland) Act 1937 has been granted). However, it does allow for other personal information to be excluded from the opinion where it is not, in the eyes of the judicial office holder, relevant to the decision or necessary for the purposes of pronouncing judgment.
263 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook