The Civil Procedure Rules 1998

Claim to privilege

Rule 6—(1) The provisions of this rule shall have effect where a claim by a witness to be exempt from giving any evidence on the ground specified in section 3 (1)(b) of the Act of 1975 is not supported or conceded as mentioned in subsection (2) of that section.

(2) The examiner may, if he thinks fit, require the witness to give the evidence to which the claim relates and, if the examiner does not do so, the Court may do so, on the application without notice being served on any other party of the person who obtained the order under section 2.

(3) If such evidence is taken—

(a) it must be contained in a document separate from the remainder of the deposition of the witness;

(b) the examiner shall send to the Senior Master with the deposition a statement signed by the examiner setting out the claim and the ground on which it was made;

(c) on receipt of the statement the Senior Master shall, notwithstanding anything in rule 5, retain the document containing the part of the witness' evidence to which the claim relates and shall send the statement and a request to determine the claim to the foreign court or tribunal with the documents mentioned in rule 5;

(d) if the claim is rejected by the foreign court or tribunal, the Senior Master shall send to that court or tribunal the document containing that part of the witness' evidence to which the claim relates, but if the claim is upheld he shall send the document to the witness, and shall in either case notify the witness and the person who obtained the order under section 2 of the court or tribunal’s determination.