The Record Cut
On 9 February 2026, the Ministry of Justice ordered Courtsdesk to delete its entire archive of magistrates’ court records.^[1]
Courtsdesk, launched in 2021 with government approval signed off by the then Lord Chancellor, was the only searchable, near real-time platform for journalists to access magistrates’ court listings and outcomes. Before it existed, two-thirds of magistrates’ courts heard cases without any advance public or press notification. The platform was used by around 1,500 journalists from 39 media organisations.^[2]
The stated reason: Courtsdesk had shared court data with a third-party AI company, allegedly including sensitive personal information such as defendants’ and victims’ addresses and dates of birth. The government described this as a breach of Courtsdesk’s agreement with HM Courts and Tribunals Service. Courtsdesk disputes this account. The company says it wrote to HMCTS sixteen times requesting dialogue and asked for the matter to be referred to the Information Commissioner’s Office. That referral did not happen. Deletion was ordered, though it was later paused under media and parliamentary pressure.^[3]
Before shutdown, Courtsdesk had used its archive to identify patterns across 25,118 cases: 1,120 child abuse victims linked to two or more defendants, geographic clustering of offending — with Rochdale the most frequent location — prosecution delays, and repeat offenders crossing force boundaries. None of this was visible when cases were handled individually and offline. This analysis was produced by Courtsdesk itself and has not been independently verified.^[4]
The government’s own inquiry into organised child sexual exploitation remained at a preparatory stage, without formal public hearings. Meanwhile, independent MP Rupert Lowe crowdfunded more than £600,000 from tens of thousands of public donors and ran a two-week public inquiry in February 2026, hearing survivor testimony directly. The statutory government inquiry had not yet taken evidence in public.^[5]
The Minister for Courts told Parliament that HMCTS would expand its own service by the end of March 2026 and launch a new licensing regime for court data access. Whether any replacement will match Courtsdesk’s capacity to surface patterns across cases remains to be seen.
The question is not whether data protection matters. It does. The question is what happens when the only tool capable of revealing systemic patterns is removed, and the replacement is designed by the same institutions whose performance the data might scrutinise.
Question: When the system that surfaces uncomfortable patterns is shut down and the replacement is built by the institution being scrutinised, who decides what the new system is designed to find?
Footnotes
^[1] Wiggin LLP, “Open Justice: Government withdraws order to delete court archive data,” 23 February 2026. https://www.wiggin.co.uk/insight/open-justice-government-withdraws-order-to-delete-court-archive-data
^[2] Legal Cheek, “Ministry of Justice orders deletion of the UK’s largest court reporting database,” 11 February 2026. https://www.legalcheek.com/2026/02/ministry-of-justice-orders-deletion-of-the-uks-largest-court-reporting-database/
^[3] Hansard, Court Reporting Data debate, 10 February 2026. https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2026-02-10/debates/037487A8-145D-44B0-AE56-37A1BBF5EE5E/CourtReportingData
^[4] Courtsdesk analysis as reported by GB News, February 2026. https://www.gbnews.com/politics/grooming-gangs-labour-u-turn-courtsdesk-delete-data
^[5] The Rape Gang Inquiry crowdfunding page; Beverley Review, “Independent Grooming Gang Inquiry Begins,” 3 February 2026.
https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/the-rape-gang-inquiry-1
Morgan Hale is independent verification without the editorial filter. Every cut is evidenced. Every question is open. Because it matters