Law Reports

The Doctrine of Precedent Court Hierarchy Structure of a Law Report Which judgments are reported? Which law report should you read? How to cite law reports Abbreviations

 

First, what are primary and secondary sources?

Legal research relies upon the use and application of primary sources of information. Primary sources are those which are direct, authoritative and not influenced by anybody's opinion. Examples are legislation, treaties, law reports, resolutions of governmental and non-governmental bodies, transcripts of debates, parliamentary papers etc. They are free from opinions and are usually prepared as a necessity. They contain the law itself.

Secondary sources are those which are not primary in nature. They are opinions, commentaries, discussions. They are useful for building an opinion on a particular topic, as a means of reflection, an argument or a description, but they do not have the same value as primary sources of information. We will be looking at both primary and secondary sources of information throughout this programme.

The Doctrine of Precedent

Case law provides the bulk of law in the United Kingdom and acts as a source of law through the mechanism of the doctrine of precedent. For a case to be cited in court it must have been reported in a Law Reports series by a barrister. According to the doctrine of precedent a court is bound by the decisions of a court above it and, usually, by a court of equivalent standing. Superior courts have the power to overrule decisions of lower courts and in certain cases to overrule their own decisions.

It important to know in which court a decision was made, and to know that a House of Lords decision is worth more than a decision made in a County Court. It is also necessary to assess the chances of a particular court not following one of its own decisions, as the rules on the application of the doctrine of precedent on this point may vary from court to court.

Usually, judges in the civil and appellate courts (both criminal and civil) will reflect upon a case before reaching a final decision. They therefore hold back or reserve judgment until a later date. In criminal cases after the jury has reached a verdict in the trial court, the judge may sentence immediately or call for reports and sentence at a later date.

Law reporting became more efficient in the middle of the nineteenth century. The Judicature Acts of 1873-1875 created a court hierarchy, which was completed when the House of Lords became the final Court of Appeal following the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876. The modern doctrine of the binding force of judicial precedent only fully emerged when there was good law reporting and a settled judicial hierarchy.

As well as the binding precedent discussed above, there is also persuasive precedent from a high court in another jurisdiction. Persuasive precedent is often argued where there are no similar cases in a jurisdiction. In new areas of law, such as virtual property and IVF, persuasive prededent may be the only precedent available.

Court Hierarchy

This diagram shows the hierarchy of the UK courts in a simplified form. Note that the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights stand alongside the UK courts hierarchy. Reference can be made to the European Court of Justice from any court in the system. The European Court of Human Rights enforces the European Convention on Human Rights. The UK Supreme Court opened in October 2009 The Supreme Court replaced the Appellate Committee of the House of Lords in early October 2009. The Supreme Court is housed in Middlesex Guildhall on Parliament Square in London.

 

Structure of a Law Report

The following is a typical law report. It begins with the names of the parties, the date of the hearing and the names of the judge or judges, and, usually, the court. Next follows the catchwords then the headnote (a summary). All law reports have a similar structure. The judgment can sometimes begin several pages after the beginning of the report. The Law Reports (Appeals Cases, Queens Bench, Chancery etc) include the arguments of counsel. One of the first things a law student has to do is learn how to navigate and interpret a law report quickly.

	Parties, date of judgment, judges
	Catchwords used for indexing
	Headnote, summarising the issues, and, after Held, summarising the judgment
	Cases cited in the judgment
	A summary of the pleading & facts may be given
	Names of Counsel; the Law Reports also give their argument
	The Judgment(s). 'Cur. adv. vult.'*
	Consequent orders of the court
	Instructing solicitors

 

* Curia advisari vult  is used to indicate that the judges took time to deliberate after the court hearings, and presented (handed down) the judgment in writing. In reports of House of Lords judgments this is indicated by something like 'Their Lordships took time to consider'.

Which judgments are reported?

Only about 4% of all formally commenced cases actually go to court for determination. Of these, not all are reported. Judgments in the Supreme Court (and, previously, House of Lords) are generally 'handed down' in print form. In other courts, decisions of judges are delivered orally and recorded verbatim by the court stenographer. Official and unofficial law reporters attend court and take shorthand notes.

Less than 2% of all judgments are reported in law reports series. Decisions of the Supreme Court (previously House of Lords) and the Court of Appeal predominate because of the weight accorded them by the doctrine of precedent. Only a small proportion of the thousands of first instance cases in the High Court are reported.

When a judgment is reported it can be found in a published law report series. When the Law Reports were proposed in 1863, it was suggested that they should include all cases which:

introduce, or appear to introduce, a new principle or a new rule materially modify an existing principle or rule. settle, or materially tend to settle, a question upon which the law is doubtful for any reason are peculiarly instructive.' (ICLR)

Judgments that interpret new statutes or interpret statutes newly are also often reported. Judges can recommend decisions for reporting, but this decision is generally made by the editors of the various law report series. This means that cases of specialist interest may be overlooked, whilst cases that add nothing new but give an impression of broad coverage may be included.

Unreported judgments

Unreported judgments can be read in court transcripts. Transcripts become available very quickly and are posted on court websites and on www.bailii.org without catchwords or headnotes or 'cases cited' or other such indexing-type information. Among the legal databses, Casetrack, Lawtel and Lexis post transcripts fairly quickly, with some indexing information. Permanent reference copies of unreported judgments are sometimes available from a limited number of courts and are deposited in the court libraries.

Since about 2001, judgments in transcript form have been cited by the neutral citation. Unreported judgments before 2001 are cited by court and date of judgment.

Unreported judgments sometimes become authorities, however they must be used with caution. In the Supreme Court (previously House of Lords), if counsel wish to cite an unreported judgment, they must seek prior leave which will only be granted upon the assurance that it contains an authorative statement of a relevant principle of law not to be found in a reported case (House of Lords Practice Directions and Standing Orders. Jan 1992)

 

Which law report should you read? Many judgments are reported in several law reports. This can be confusing - which report should you read? There is a general hierarchy of law reports - for the fullest and most authoritative report read the Law Reports. Often All England or specialist reports will be cited on reading lists - generally speaking, the judgment should be the same in each report, bearing in mind that the judges will have checked the judgment as printed in the Law Reports series.

The Law Reports: Appeals Cases (AC), Queen's Bench (QB), Family (Fam), Chancery (Ch) etc are the most authoritative reports. The judgment is checked by the judge(s), and the arguments of Counsel are included. They have been published by the Incorporated Council of Law Reporting (ICLR) since 1865. They report important judgments from the Supreme Court (and, previously, House of Lords) and Privy Council, the Court of Appeal (Criminal and Civil Divisions), the Chancery, Family, and Queen's Bench Divisions of the High Court, and the Employment Appeal Tribunal and the European Court of Justice. The Weekly Law Reports (WLR) are also published by the ICLR. Judgments in Volumes 2 and 3 of the WLRs probably will be republished in the Law Reports after the judgment has been checked by the judge. Judgments in Volume 1 of the WLRs probably won't be republished. The All England Law Reports (All ER) have been published by Butterworths/Lexis since 1936. Coverage is similar to the Law Reports. The All ERs carry useful cross references to Halsbury's Statutes and Halsbury's Laws. There are many subject-based or specialist law reports, eg Criminal Law Reports (Crim LR). There may be good reason to cite specialist reports rather than the Law Reports. Legal journals, eg Criminal Law Review (Crim LR), Solicitors Journal (SJ), carry case comments and case notes by academics and other specialists. If you cite a case comment, include a citation of the 'best report'. Newspaper law reports, eg Times (TLR).

How to cite law reports

Contemporary judgments are issued with 'neutral citations' identifying the year of the judgment in square brackets, the court and the judgment number. The judgments are numbered consecutively throughout each year.

• The abbreviation for the Supreme Court is UKSC and for the House of Lords it was UKHL. Judgments from the Privy Council are identified by UKPC.
• England and Wales Court of Appeal judgments are identified by EWCA Crim (for the Criminal Division) and EWCA Civ (for the Civil Division).
• The England and Wales High Court is identified by EWHC, with the various Divisions being indicated in brackets after the judgment number. (QB) indicates the Queen's Bench Division, (Fam) indicates the Family Division, (Ch) indicates Chancery, and so on.
• Neutral citations have also been adopted by Tribunals. Judgments from the UK Immigration Appeals Tribunal are indicated by UKIAT, for example.

There is more information about abbreviations in neutral citations on bailii and on Justcite.

 

Name of case Claimant v Defendent or Applicant v Respondent	Year	Abbreviation of Court	Judgment Number	High Court Division
Jameel v Wall Street Journal Europe	[2006]	UKHL	44
R v Stewart	[2009]	EWCA Crim	593
University of Oxford and Ors v Broughton and Ors	[2008]	EWHC	75	(QB)

 

With neutral citations paragraphs in judgments began to be numbered. This made it easier to identify or to pinpoint specific text in electronic versions of judgments that have no page numbers. There is more about pinpoints below.

Some judgments prior to 2001 are available with neutral citations on the bailii website. These judgments, which are not authoritative, are provided as part of a project to identify leading cases from the past and to make these freely and openly available on the internet.

In addition to citing the neutral citation, and, of course, for all cases before the introduction of neutral citations, it is necessary to cite the law report in which a report of the judgment can be found. Generally, these citations are as follows:

Name of case Claimant v Defendent or Applicant v Respondent	Year	Volume	Abbreviation of series	First page of report	Court
Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball Co	[1893]	1	QB	256	(CA)
Donoghue v Stevenson	[1932]		AC	562	(HL Sc)
El Ajou v Dollar Land Holdings	[1993]	3	All ER	717	(Ch)
Bailey	(1983)	77	Cr App R	76	(CA)

 

If a judgment has been issued with a neutral citation and reported in a law reports series, then both citations should be given, as shown in the example below:

R (Roberts) v Parole Board [2004] EWCA Civ 1031, [2005] QB 410

As the neutral citation indicates the court, it is not necessary to include the court abbreviation after the citation, as is done with reports of judgments that have no neutral citation.

About square brackets and round brackets

Round brackets ( ) are used around the year in a legal citation when the series has consecutive volume numbers and the year is not essential for finding the case. For example, to find the report cited as (1983) 77 Cr App R 76 you don't need the date because the volume number - 77 - indicates where you will find the report.

Square brackets [ ] are used where the series has no consecutive volume numbers and the year is essential for finding the correct volume. So, the report of Donoghue v Stevenson is in the 1932 volume of the Appeals Cases, beginning at page 562. Neutral citations also use square brackets for the year.

The Law Reports, the All Englands, and some other reports series that use the year as a volume number often have more than one volume each year. In these cases, there will be a number to indicate which of the annual volumes to consult. These annual volume numbers rarely go above 5.

Square brackets and round brackets are used in the same way in legal journal citations.

Pinpoints

The page number is cited after the first page of the report, or after the court, to refer a read to particular sections of a judgment. This is called the pinpoint, which in the following example is 714:

Beattie v E & F Beattie Ltd [1938] Ch 708 (CA) 714

If the pinpoint to a paragraph number, it is inserted in square brackets at the end of the citation. The [45] in square brackets at the end of the citation in R v G is the pinpoint; it refers the reader to paragraph 45.

R v G [2003] UKHL 50, [2004] 1 AC 1034 [45]

Abbreviations

Abbreviations are commonly used when referring to law reports and law journals. Sometimes it can be impossible to find a law report or article if you don't know what the abbreviation in the citation stands for. Two key sources for finding out what legal abbreviations mean are the Cardiff Index (online) and Raistrick (a book).

Finding out about abbreviations online

The Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations is a web-based service that allows you to search for the meaning of abbreviations for English language legal publications (UK, Commonwealth and US) and major foreign language law publications. The database indexes law reports and journals, and some legislative publications and major textbooks. Westlaw, Lexis and other databases also have information about abbreviations.

Finding out about abbreviations in books

D. Raistrick, Index to Legal Citations and Abbreviations (3rd ed. Sweet & Maxwell, London 2008) is at the Main Desk in the Bodleian Law Library and at Ref Bibl Cw UK R159c3.

In the Bodleian Law Library , the card catalogue includes an extensive list of abbreviations with shelf marks so you can easily locate the report or journal you have to read. The Digest, Current Law and various other publications also include information about legal abbreviations.