Court of Appeal, 24 February 2026, Decision concerning public access to the register, UPC_CoA_9/2026, UPC_CoA_10/2026

This ensures that the decision will be taken by the judge-rapporteur, who is familiar with the case file.

Headnotes: Reasoned requests to the Registry for written pleadings and evidence (access to documents pursuant to R. 262.1(b) RoP), lodged at the Court of First Instance, shall be made to the relevant Division. Similarly, reasoned requests for written pleadings and evidence, lodged at the Court of Appeal, shall be made to the Court of Appeal.

The provision that a decision will be taken by the judge-rapporteur after consulting the parties (R. 262.1(b) RoP) ensures that the judge adjudicating on access is familiar with the case file, separately for each instance.

Headnotes: Re-lodging on appeal of documents lodged at the Court of First Instance is normally not called for since the Court of Appeal shall consult the file of the proceedings before the Court of First Instance pursuant to R. 222.1 RoP. Such consultation does not generate any copies of the documents into the file of the proceedings before the Court of Appeal.

If a party, for reasons of its own, re-lodges documents on appeal, this not only represents additional work for parties and the Court alike, but it also means that members of the public can chose to request access to those documents from the Court of First Instance, the Court of Appeal, or if there is reason for it, both.

Request must be reasoned. In particular, it requires stating a purpose in order to enable the judge-rapporteur to balance interests (Art. 45 UPCA).

Headnote: A request for written pleadings and evidence must be specified and cannot be made in terms which would require the Court to search and select documents based on relevance criteria set up by the requesting party.