Discovery Practice Note issued in Australia

The Chief Justice of the Federal Court of Australia yesterday gave effect to the long-awaited Practice Note No 17 – The use of technology in the management of discovery and the conduct of litigation.

Those of us involved in drafting the proposed new Technology Questionnaire and draft Practice Direction in the UK have been keen to keep up with parallel initiatives in the Common Law jurisdictions. and particularly Australia and Canada.

The timing of its final release is good and bad from my point of view – good in that I am due to speak on a panel at LegalTech in New York next week about international initiatives in electronic discovery, and bad in that I have enough to do to be ready for tomorrow’s flight without exciting new developments to read up.

Fortunately, one of my co-speakers on that panel is Jo Sherman who was heavily involved in the drafting of the Practice Note, so I can leave it to her to cover it. I will read it on the plane and cover it in more detail shortly.

My thanks to Geoffrey Lambert of KordaMentha in Melbourne and to Seamus Byrne who each sent me a link to the Practice Note within hours of its promulgation.

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Legal Technology Awards 2009

I went to the Legal Technology Awards last night at the kind invitation of Nigel Murray of Trilantic. Nigel disappointingly, turned up in black tie and not the lycra cycling gear which we had hoped to see (read Murray to cycle across the Channel if you find this reference obscure).

Trilantic emerged as Highly Commended in the category Electronic Disclosure Support / Service Provider of the year in this, its third year of being short-listed. The category winners were Merrill Legal Solutions.