The disclosure pilot set out in Practice Direction 51U, now in force in many UK civil courts, requires completion of a Disclosure Review Document. Among other things, the DRD requires parties to agree how they will transfer information between them in the disclosure process.

The matters to be agreed are set out in Section 3 of Appendix 2 to the Practice Direction, and specifically in paragraphs 6 (7) – (11). Those without the relevant skills will observe the footnote to the “Appropriate methodology” section:

The onus is on the parties to ensure they engage appropriate IT forensic expertise to assist with this process if they or their legal advisers do not have such expertise in house.

A working party from the UK ILTA Litigation Support Special Interest Group has spent the past few months working with UK eDisclosure suppliers to draft a best practice protocol, along with guidelines for its use. You can see the results, along with the suppliers and law firms associated with this initiative, here.

The documents are free to download and can be used by anyone. The working group hopes that any law firm using the protocol will add their logo to the list, but this is not required.

The working group is keen to get feedback on both the protocol and the guidelines. An email link is shown on the website for responses. Additionally, there will be a formal launch/feedback meeting on the evening of Tuesday 30th April in central London, where both suppliers and practitioners will able to give their input, and then enjoy some hospitality.

You can register for this event by email to iltaprotocol@iltanet.org

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