New guidelines on reporting restrictions in magistrates courts gave the basis for a successful challenge of an order to ban naming a baby in a cruelty case.

North West Evening Mail reporter Suzanne Murphy was in court to challenge an order made by Furness magistrates on the 10-month-old baby.

She argued it would have made it impossible to name the mother who had left her baby alone all night to go out drinking.

Her request was initially turned down but the magistrates’ clerk agreed to hear further representations from editor Sara Hadwin.

She turned to the guidelines booklet produced by the Judicial Studies Board, the Society of Editors and the Newspaper Society.

The booklet was used to convince the magistrates to lift the Section 39 order which would have granted anonymity to the guilty mother.

Specifically on such orders, the booklet states: “Age alone is insufficient to justify the order. Courts have accepted that very young children cannot be harmed by publicity of which they will be unaware and therefore section 39 orders are unnecessary.”

After hearing her submission, magistrates agreed to lift the order “in line with the Judicial Studies Board guidance”.

Editor Sara said: “We believed the order was unnecessary and were relieved that magistrates were prepared to re-examine the issue and ultimately lift the order so the case could be reported properly.

“The new guidelines are a great help for editors and the weight they carried with the bench was most welcome.

“Hopefully the guidelines will help courts to reduce the number of unnecessary orders made as well as providing the basis of further successful challenges.

“It is also important that all reporters follow Suzanne’s example and alert the court and their editor to any orders which appear to fall outside the guidelines.”

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