The Supreme Court says justice must be seen to be done, but is anyone watching?

The UK's Supreme Court has made over 900 hours of archive trial footage available to view on demand at www.supremecourt.uk

Real-world legal proceedings are rarely as lively as series two of Broadchurch would have us believe (ITV)

The ultimate in binge-watching has arrived (sort of). This week the UK’s Supreme Court made over 900 hours of archive trial footage available to view on demand at www.supremecourt.uk, supplementing the live feed that’s been available since 2011.

“Now justice can be seen to be done at a time which suits you,” said the court’s president Lord Neuberger. It sounds exciting, doesn’t it? Until you realise ’highlights’ include disputes over the finer points of EU licensing law and abstract discussions over what constitute “reasonable grounds”. Perhaps Netflix needn’t sweat the competition just yet.

In fact, this is the latest in a series of moves towards televising trials in Britain. Although filming and broadcasting are allowed in Scottish courts provided the participants consent, in England and Wales both have been banned under the Criminal Justice Act since 1925 (with the exception of the Supreme Court, created outside the ban in 2009). In 2004, however, the lord chancellor Lord Falconer decided to allow cameras into the appeal courts as part of a pilot scheme. Plans were then shelved until 2013, the same year that Channel 4 broadcast documentary The Murder Trial consisting of footage of the Edinburgh retrial of fruit and veg wholesaler Nat Fraser for the murder of his wife. Under pressure from broadcasters, the Government relented and provisions to allow filming in courts were included in the Queen’s Speech.

At all of these stages, the same arguments and counter-arguments have been raised. Would the presence of cameras deter witnesses from appearing, or encourage showboating from otherwise sober legal professionals? For many, it seemed inevitable that Britain was headed towards US-style courtroom sensationalism, as epitomised in the 1994-5 trial of OJ Simpson. It’s telling then that, twenty years on, the legacy of that trial has been most obvious not in law, but in television, where it led, via Simpson’s defence counsel Robert Kardashian to the global celebrity of the Kardashian sisters. The elderly gentleman of Britain’s supreme court usually remain seated during proceedings, so we can’t be sure if any possess an arse that could “break the internet”, but so far they make unlikely stars of reality television.

There’s no doubt that TV impacts on the public’s view of justice, but it seems real courtrooms exert far less influence than the made up ones. Real-life barristers are rarely as kooky as Ally McBeal or as heroic as Alicia from The Good Wife and testimony is hardly ever as lively as the wailing in Broadchurch series two would have us believe; real courts are simply dull by comparison. This is also what makes the stated goal of transparency campaigners — restoring public faith in the legal system — seem so remote. How can justice be seen to be done, if no one’s actually watching?

Why Red Dwarf is the pinnacle of British sci-fi

When the new series of Red Dwarf arrives on Dave in 2016, it will be the fourth time in 27 years that the British sci-fi series has been resurrected. It’s not the quality of the production which makes this show so indestructible; even devoted fans admit that has varied widely. Nor is the concept of unheroic astronauts in a ramshackle spaceship so innovative.

Indestructible: Red Dwarf arrives in 2016 (Getty) (Getty Images)

Red Dwarf creators Rob Grant and Doug Naylor admit to the influence of 1974 film Dark Star. No, what makes Red Dwarf so beloved is how well this style of grubby, unglamorous sci-fi fits the British temperament. The best proof of this is the failure of a US version to ever get past the pilot stage. They tried to turn Dave Lister into a clean-cut, good-looking hero, when everyone knows he’s just a slobby smeg-head.

CATCH UP

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Penny Dreadful, SkyGo

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