The #DCS (Crown Court digital case system) is here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future. @TheCriminalBar

Chair Tana Adkin KC message:

“A fundamental part of the IT revolution was a move to put case materials ‘online’.

This was a joint project initiated by the CPS in 2011 at the same time as the Bar Council published

a paper on cost saving in the CJS which urged more use of IT including using the internet to store and transmit case materials digitally.

In order to get something up and running as quickly and efficiently as possible the  CBA and CPS worked together utilising a pre-existing

document bundling program which was adapted to create the Crown Court Digital Case System.

It was far from perfect but was only ever intended as the first step.   In 2016 HMCTS proposed the ‘Big Bang’ in the form of the Common Platform.

The principal motive was to refine and enhance the existing technology to increase stability, integrating multiple systems – of which there were many which did not speak to each other – so that they could work seamlessly.

  It was intended that this would replace the DCS and for the past few years the CBA has continued to collaborate with

HMCTS to ensure the replacement would be better than the DCS.   The reforms proposed by the Common Platform have been hard to achieve but most ambitious IT

projects run into problems and one this ambitious was always going to be particularly challenging.

Last week HMCTS announced that “We will focus on getting the existing technology right to enable us to provide a more consistent and reliable service

to those seeking access to justice through our courts and tribunals” and “we will no longer deliver some parts of it as we had planned.

This will allow us to get the current systems and processes to perform to their maximum capacity and ability before adding more……

We will retain the Crown Court Digital Case System, identifying ways we can enhance it in future, while making sure it works effectively alongside Common Platform.”

This means that the DCS is here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future.

In 2019 the CBA Tech Sub-Committee sought feedback on issues with the DCS which counsel felt could be improved and as a result we submitted a detailed report on potential

improvements which we hoped would be incorporated into its replacement.  As one can see from the HMCTS announcement, they are working through these with the operators of the DCS. Watch this space.”

Source: X