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Your Witness
... the expert’s forum for discussion and information
dissemination
Published quarterly and distributed free to all
registered expert witnesses, Your Witness acts as a forum
for the discussion and dissemination of information relevant to
practising expert witnesses.
Coverage ranges from highly topical issues (such as legal reform
and court reports) to more ‘background’ business matters
(including getting paid, fees, disbursements
and much more).
The following table shows the contents of the last four issues.
To gauge the quality of Your Witness firsthand, you can
read and
on-line.
| Issue 66,
December 2011 |
In this issue we look at the ability others have to reuse expert witness reports from unrelated proceedings
and report on two cases which have seen the Jones -v- Kaney judgment play an important role,
in one case it meant a proper defence had to be raised by an expert witness and in another the fact the expert
witness could now be sued was critical in the Court of Appeal rejecting an application.
We also consider the admissibility of expert evidence that was prepared for someone who is no longer a party to a court
case and take a first look at the recently published Family Justice Review as it relates to expert witness and at some Woolf-like reforms taking place in Scotland. |
| Issue 65,
September 2011 |
In this issue we launch, in response to Jones -v- Kaney, the UK Register of Expert Witnesses Professional Indemnity Insurance Scheme,
designed to offer expert witnesses top-quality cover at market-beating prices. We reveal the outcome of our ninth bi-annual expert witness survey
and we consider a case that deals with whether prior knowledge of one of the parties, or some other aspect of the case, compromises an expert
witness’s claim to independence. We look at the impact that discrediting an expert witness should have on past cases and we underline the
important distinction between expert advisors and expert witnesses when a party decides to ditch one expert witness and seek the opinion of another.
Finally, we report on a family court case that has an important message for all expert witnesses about what can and cannot be kept confidential. |
| Issue 64,
June 2011 |
In this issue we take a long hard look at the Supreme Court decision in Jones v Kaney and consider some of its
consequences, the decision-making process itself and some import considerations for expert
witnesses under the new liability regime. We summarise the three different Statements of Truth that you need to use on reports for civil, family
and criminal courts and introduce the new Family Procedure Rules Practice Direction 25A dealing with experts, which
contains some helpful ammunition for experts trying to get their instructing lawyers in line. Finally, we preview a bespoke insurance scheme for
experts in the UK Register of Expert Witnesses,
announce a new LittleBook on marketing and enclose the latest survey form in our biannual series
of surveys of the expert witness world. |
| Issue 63,
March 2011 |
In this issue we welcome the arrival, after a decade-long gestation, of the Family Procedure Rules which come into force on 6 April 2011. They provide a single set of rules for family proceedings in high courts, county courts and magistrates’ courts in the style of the Civil Procedure Rules and contain little to surprise experts. We review a case in which the controversial Low Copy Number DNA technique – in which tiny amounts of DNA are processed – is declared sufficiently established to be admissible in court. We consider what to do if those who instruct you are trying to hide your report from the court, comment on guidance from the Crown Prosecution Service on ‘shaken baby’ cases and on the use of ‘likelihood ratios’ based on dodgy databases, and clear up some confusion over whether a recent tax tribunal case means experts no longer need to charge VAT on their reports. |
What the experts say
‘I receive various publications from
the Academy of Experts, Expert Witness Institute and Chartered Institute
of Arbitrators, all of which I try to read, more or less, or at
least scan through for useful information. Your Witness is easy
to read... and contains information useful to me and other experts.
In my opinion, the best source of information of them all!’
Terry Wolfe, Flooring Consultant
‘... as always, [Your Witness]...
is an informative and stimulating publication in keeping with the
generally very high standard of the UK Register of Expert Witnesses.’
Dr P K Buxton, Consultant Dermatologist
‘Can I compliment you on the periodic
publication of Your Witness, which I find informative and very readable.’
Mike Lucas, Management Consultant and Knot Analyst
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