1.—(1) This Order may be cited as the Crown Office (Preparation and Authentication of Documents Rules) Order 1988 and shall come into force on 1st September 1988.
(2) References in this Order to documents are to documents to which the Crown Office Act 1877 applies and references to a Schedule are references to a Schedule to this Order.
2. Except where the Lord Chancellor, thinking it more convenient that a particular document should be passed under the Great Seal, has so directed, all the documents specified in Schedule 1 shall be authenticated by the impression of the Wafer Great Seal.
3. The documents specified in Schedule 1 may be printed or written or partly printed and partly written.
4. Except where the Lord Chancellor, thinking it more convenient that a particular document should be prepared on the material employed for such documents at any earlier time, has so directed, all the documents specified in Part I of Schedule 1 shall be prepared on parchment, those specified in Part II may be prepared on paper or parchment, and those specified in Part III shall be prepared on paper.
5. The name of the Clerk of the Crown shall be subscribed or printed at the end of all documents, by way of authentication of their having passed through the Crown Office.
6. Any document may, with the leave of the Lord Chancellor, be illuminated with the Royal Arms and any other decoration in one or more colours by hand, in such manner as the Lord Chancellor may approve.
7. The Rules set out in the instruments specified in Schedule 2 are hereby revoked.
G. I. de Deney
Clerk of the Privy Council