Courts witness rise of covert recordings

♦ Warring couples are increasingly recording conversations to use in legal proceedings, a family court judge has said. Sir James Munby said covert recording had become a “much more pressing issue” in recent years.

The judge suggested one reason was a “mindset” of mistrust in the courts. His comments came in a ruling on a case in which a man embroiled in a dispute over a child had made covert recordings of conversations with a social worker and a solicitor. “The courts have had to grapple with the legal and procedural issues generated by the concealed observer since time immemorial,” said Sir James, the president of the Family Division of the High Court and a Court of Appeal judge. “But in family courts the issue has become much more pressing.”

He pointed to two reasons. “One is the increasing sophistication and ever decreasing cost of modern recording equipment. The other, I fear, has to do with the distrust in too many quarters of the competence or even the integrity of the family justice system.”