CROWN COURT, the popular Seventies TV programme, is being shown again on satellite television. The first episode was broadcast yesterday on Legal TV, a channel devoted to all matters legal.

Many of today’s lawyers will have had their first glimpse of the law watching Crown Court. The trial took place over three episodes — on Monday it was the prosecution case, on Wednesday the defence and on Friday the verdict.

But if Crown Court inspired many present-day lawyers, it is a shame that the public still has to make do with court dramas rather than any real court proceedings on the small screen. The law still does not allow any broadcast of court proceedings, as stipulated by the Criminal Justice Act 1925.

The closest we have come yet to the broadcast of any trial or hearing came with a pilot programme in the Court of Appeal that allowed filming of court proceedings in England and Wales for the first time. The pilot was finished in December 2004 and the public consultation ended in February last year.

At the time, it seemed that the moment for cameras in court had finally come. But here we are, nearly two years later, and the issue is still on hold. So what, you may well ask, has happened in the meantime? The pilot programme could really not have gone better. It was the culmination of many months of work by the broadcasters ITN, BBC, Sky, ITV, Channel 4 and Five who had finally got the go-ahead from the Department for Constitutional Affairs (DCA) and the judiciary.

Cameras were set up in the courts of the Lord Chief Justice and of the Master of the Rolls. A range of civil and criminal appeals were filmed. An agreed protocol gave judges complete control over filming. The cameras were discreet — there were no cameramen in court, the cameras were small and remotely controlled.

The pilot was based on the parliamentary model. The cameras in the court were operated by the same company that runs the cameras in Parliament. If cameras are allowed into Parliament, was the thinking of the broadcasters, why not the courts?

After the pilot programme, the broadcasters compiled a videotape for the DCA. Channel 4 and ITV News both produced court reports for a scheduled news programme, Sky produced live “breaking news” for a 24-hour news channel and the BBC compiled a longer in-depth programme. The reports all included footage from the court hearings. The tape made interesting viewing.

The results of the public consultation showed that the public is broadly supportive of allowing cameras into court — subject to appropriate controls. For example, 56 per cent were in favour of filming in criminal cases in the Court of Appeal, 58 per cent said that filming of sentencing should be allowed in some circumstances.

The Bar Council of England and Wales also said that the absolute ban on televising court proceedings should be removed — an approach consistent with its 1989 report chaired by Jonathan Caplan, QC.

After all this, one might have expected the issue to go forward. But it hasn’t. There still been no decision.

The Department for Constitutional Affairs said last week: “We hope to make a decision later this year. Lord Falconer (of Thoroton) is keen to move the issue on and wants to make a decision as soon as possible.”

The broadcasters hope that the DCA will now take this issue forward. Most leading jurisdictions allow some form of filming of proceedings — Australia, New Zealand, the United States, South Africa, Scotland and Canada. England and Wales are very much the odd men out.

The DCA would seem to have three options:

Embrace the issue properly and allow filming in all courts, including the Crown Court, subject to appropriate judicial controls.

The main area of sensitivity is witnesses. Clearly witnesses in criminal trials must be given special consideration. But this should not derail the whole debate and be a justification for no filming at all. Areas such as sentencing or delivery of the verdict would seem particularly appropriate for filming.

The legal system itself stands to benefit from allowing the cameras in. Witnesses and jurors would turn up at court having actually seen a real court in action. It would help to dispel the fears of those who believe that the courts are all about witnesses being reduced to tears by over-aggressive cross-examination, and gasping and fainting in the public gallery at the verdict. Lawyers know such drama is not the norm. That’s not always the case with the public.

Cameras in court would also bring the principle of open justice to a new level. Why shouldn’t technology be employed to give effect to the public’s right to see what happens in its courts? Is it not time the law moves on reflecting changes in communication and the experience of the pilot study, filming in inquiries, the Caplan report and the international dimension? It would be a pity if the issue of televising the courts was allowed to go into hibernation again. The next step is surely to allow some form of filming. Televising the courts is going to happen at some point. The real question is when?

The author is head of compliance at ITN and a barrister

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