The preservation of commercially sensitive information during litigation

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Issues of confidentiality often arise in litigation under procurement challenges, as illustrated in the recent case of Bechtel v High Speed Two (HS2) [2021] EWHC 458.

In this case Mr Justice Fraser noted, “[I]n my judgment, the level of profit in percentage terms that a tenderer included in its bid in this procurement competition is properly described as commercially confidential, and is also something that any tenderer, whether a claimant in proceedings or otherwise, would wish to keep confidential for justifiable reasons.”[35]

In terms of how to retain the confidentiality of such information during litigation, it is contrary to open justice and transparency to have trials conducted (even partially) in secret for all but those legal representatives who sit within a court’s prescribed ‘confidentiality ring’.

At the same time judgements need to be readily comprehensible and include reference to all relevant material and reasoning of the the judge, so having a separate confidential appendix or schedule in a judgement should only occur when there is no viable alternative.

In the circumstances of the present case Mr Justice Fraser concluded there was no viable alternative available to him, for without such a confidential appendix to his judgement (available only to those within the ‘confidentiality ring’), he “would run the real risk of destroying justified confidentiality in commercial issues.”[34]

Published by

Associate Professor Andrew Beale OBE

Previously our Acting Head of College Andrew joined us in 2004 as the Director of IP Wales®, our £4m award winning business support initiative. ‌ Originally the Head of Swansea Law School (University of Wales Trinity Saint David) Andrew became the Director of the Swansea Intellectual Property Rights Initiative in 1999. In recognition of its support for Small & Medium Enterprise (SME) use of the IP system the Swansea IPR Initiative became the Winner of the Wales one-2-one Best 4 Business Award in 2000. Andrew was responsible for designing and launching IP Wales® in 2002. IP Wales® was the recipient of the Judges Special Prize at the WORLDLeaders European Awards in 2004. Under Andrew’s leadership over 800 businesses have been assisted to make informed commercial choices about their IP assets helping them to capture and protect over 220 patents, 70 trade marks and 10 design registrations around the World. Support was furnished to over 25 licensing deals (licensing-in & licensing-out) facilitating the commercial use of intangible assets by integrating an intellectual assets (IAs) strategy within the overall business plan. In recognition of his success in raising levels of awareness and understanding of IP amongst the SME community in Wales Andrew was seconded from 2008-9 to work for the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Whilst at WIPO Andrew co-organised and presented at the ‘WIPO Forum on Intellectual Property & SMEs for IP Offices of OECD and EU Enlargement Countries’ (2008) in Cardiff, one of the few occasions this prestigious event has been hosted outside Geneva. Andrew achieved National recognition for ‘services to intellectual property and business in Wales’ with the award of an OBE by the Queen under her Birthday Honours List 2009. International speaking invitations have included presenting to the World Intellectual Property Organisation, the World Trade Organisation, the European Commission and the European Patent Office. Andrew remains as the Director of IP Wales® and was responsible for the validation of our new LLM programme in Intellectual Property and Commercial Practice. Andrew is the module leader for International Intellectual Property Law, the Law of Intellectual Assets Management & Transactions and also lectures 'Oily IP' on our new LLM in Oil & Gas.

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