Andy Coulson and “secret justice”
Following the appearance of the Prime Minister's former director of communications, Andy Coulson, last week at Glasgow Sheriff Court in private in connection with charges of perjury, the Editor of the Scottish Review, Kenneth Roy has said there is no public justification for the proceedings to have been heard in private.
Andy Coulson faces criminal charges in Scotland and England
In a piece headlined “Andy Coulson and Scotland's secret justice“, Roy argues that there was no necessity for the order preventing reporting of the proceedings to have been made.
“Any departure from the principle of open justice must be exceptional in order to be justified. It must be based on necessity,” he wrote.
Coulson is charged with perjury arising from testimony given in the Tommy Sheridan perjury case. No plea or declaration was made and Coulson was granted bail. An order under S4(2) of the Contempt of Court Act had been made preventing reporting of the proceedings, but this was opposed by various media groups and subsequently rescinded.
“There was nothing unusual about this procedure,” Roy wrote.
“People facing serious criminal charges often make a preliminary appearance in private, either in the sheriff's chambers or in a courtroom closed to the public. Indeed the charges do not necessarily have to be all that serious to justify such a course of action.
“For some reason, a reason that has still not been publicly disclosed, when Mr Coulson appeared in Glasgow last Thursday, the sheriff made a contempt of court order prohibiting publication of any – repeat, any – details of the case. Later that day, and all of Friday, and throughout the weekend, and all of Monday too, the media were banned from reporting that a prominent public figure had appeared in Glasgow Sheriff Court charged with perjury.
“Here's the point: the public has a right to know what is going on in our criminal courts. The interests of justice, and of the people, demand no less. In the administration of that right, the media are our eyes and ears. They are the guardians of our liberty. This is bedrock stuff,” he concluded.
Mr Roy also said that it was an “unusual feature” of the case that Coulson is represented by Richard Keen QC, Dean of the Faculty of Advocates. Keen formerly represented Tommy Sheridan in his 2006 civil action against the News of the World - formerly edited by Coulson - prior to his dismissal and Sheridan opting to represent himself.
“What happened last Thursday was a disturbing development, all the more regrettable for the absence of any public justification. Is this the way we are heading?” Roy asked.