Angus McCullough KC: The Undermining of Secret Justice

Double Jeopardy - The Law and Politics Podcast

Ken Macdonald and Tim Owen welcome back Angus McCullough KC, who has extensive experience in public and private law and who was the most experienced Special Advocate until his decision to step down in October 2023 in protest at the Government's failure to implement urgent changes to the system of secret justice (as recommended in December 2022 by the former High Court Judge Sir Duncan Ouseley).

This episode is dedicated to discussing the controversy surrounding the Closed Material Procedure (CMP) introduced by the Justice and Security Act 2013. The debate this law sparked around the management of sensitive information during civil proceedings and the balance between national security and fairness/openness is once again highly topical. Angus's decision to refuse to take on any new closed material cases has now been followed 8 months later by some 25 other Special Advocates (including 16 KCs), a decision which leaves the entire system for litigating national security cases in crisis. Unless and until this specialist cohort of barristers are willing to accept new cases, the system will grind to a halt.

Ken, Tim and Angus discuss the future of CMP’s, Sir Duncan Ouseley’s independent review, the underfunded justice system, and Labour's depressing response to the prisons crisis as reflected in Keir Starmer's stance in PMQs and Shabana Mahmood's public commitment to building more prisons rather than ending the UK's addiction to imprisonment.