income from printed copies of claims and judgments

Summary

The requester asked for income statistics regarding printed and digital copies of claims and judgments, as well as policies on publishing judgments. The General Registry responded that it does not hold the specific financial data requested and confirmed that no formal policy documents exist regarding the open justice principle or publication percentages.

Key Facts

• The authority does not hold information on total public counter till transactions or income for printed and digital copies of claims and judgments.
• No policy documents, meeting agendas, or minutes exist regarding the open justice legal principle or the scope of judgments uploaded to www.judgments.im.
• There is no legislative requirement to publish judgments, and publication depends on factors such as setting a legal precedent.
• Family cases have specific safeguards to prevent party identification, affecting publication decisions.
• The General Registry 2023 Annual Report contains data on the number of judgments uploaded annually from 2020 onwards.

Data Disclosed

• 60 pence per page
• 6 pounds per document
• 2024-05-07
• 2024-06-05
• 3844441
• 2020
• 2023

Exemptions Cited

• Information not held

Original Request

Please supply the total public counter till transactions and the total income related to (1) printed black and white copies of claims and judgments charged at 60 pence per page (2) digital copies of claims and judgments charged at 6 pounds per document. If a unique till transaction code does not apply to just (1) and/or (2) please clarify the other document types included in the totals with any estimated document ratios and any historical statistics that include income from copy claims and judgments. Please supply a copy of any policy or policy amendments in meeting agendas and meeting minutes in relation to the open justice legal principle and the scope and/or percentage of claims and judgments uploaded to the www.judgments.im website.

Data Tables (1)

Full Response Text

M ###

General Registry Oik- Recortyssee Chief Registrar
Stuart Quayle

Isle of Man Courts of Justice Deemsters Walk, Bucks Road Douglas, Isle of Man IM1 3AR

Telephone:
(01624) 685979 Email: DPO- GenReg@gov.im

Our ref: 3844441 5 June 2024

Dear ####

We write further to your request received 7 May 2024, which states:

"Please supply the total public counter till transactions and the total income related to (1) printed black and white copies of claims and judgments charged at 60 pence per page (2) digital copies of claims and judgments charged at 6 pounds per document.

If a unique till transaction code does not apply to just (1) and/or (2) please clarify the other document types included in the totals with any estimated document ratios and any historical statistics that include income from copy claims and judgments.

Please supply a copy of any policy or policy amendments in meeting agendas and meeting minutes in relation to the open justice legal principle and the scope and/or percentage of claims and judgments uploaded to the www.judgments.im website."

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance the public authority does not hold or cannot, after taking reasonable steps to do so, find the information that you have requested in paragraphs 1 and 2 above.

With reference to paragraph 3 above:

No documents of this nature exist. There is no legislative requirement to publish judgments, there are certain safeguards in family cases, for example, to prevent the parties being identified. The approach in recent years is that any written judgment in the Staff of Government is published, but this does not apply to other courts. Written judgments are not always issued and whether a judgment is published is determined by whether or not a legal precedent has been set, for example.

There is no percentage figure for how many judgments are published as opposed to handed down whether orally or in writing. However, the General Registry 2023 Annual Report confirms how many judgments have been uploaded each year from 2020. The report can be found here: https://courts.im/media/3542/general-registry-2023-annual- report-1.pdf.

Please quote the reference number 3844441 in any future communications.

Your right to request a review

If you are unhappy with this response to your freedom of information request, you may ask us to carry out an internal review of the response, by completing a complaint form and submitting it electronically or by delivery/post.

An electronic version of our complaint form can be found by going to our website at https://services.gov.im/freedom-of-information/Review . If you would like a paper version of our complaint form to be sent to you by post, please contact me and I will be happy to arrange for this. Your review request should explain why you are dissatisfied with this response, and should be made as soon as practicable. We will respond as soon as the review has been concluded.

If you are not satisfied with the result of the review, you then have the right to appeal to the Information Commissioner for a decision on; 1. Whether we have responded to your request for information in accordance with Part 2 of the Freedom of Information Act 2015; or 2. Whether we are justified in refusing to give you the information requested.
In response to an application for review, the Information Commissioner may, at any time, attempt to resolve a matter by negotiation, conciliation, mediation or another form of alternative dispute resolution and will have regard to any outcome of this in making any subsequent decision. More detailed information on your right to a review can be found on the Information Commissioner’s website at www.inforights.im. Should you have any queries concerning this letter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Further information about freedom of information requests can be found at www.gov.im/foi.

I will now close your request as of this date.

Yours sincerely

FOI Co-ordinator