An interactive guide to the basics

of OSCOLA referencing

Produced by Sam Bourton

Case citations without neutral citations

case name | [year] OR (year) | volume | report abbreviation |

first page | (court)

Page v Smith [1996] AC 155 (HL)

As this example shows, when the year is used to identify the law report volume it is given in square brackets. In
such cases, also give a volume number if the series in question was issued in more than one volume during that
particular year, but do not do so if only one volume was issued.

Barrett v Enfield LBC [2001] 2 AC 550 (HL)

Where the year is necessary to identify the volume and there is more than one volume in a year, give the year
in square brackets and the volume number before the report abbreviation, as in this example from volume two
of the 2001 Appeal Cases.

Barrett v Enfield LBC (1999) 49 BMLR 1 (HL)

Give the year of judgment (not publication) in round brackets when the volumes of the law report series are
independently numbered, so that the year of publication is not needed to find the volume. For example, a re-
port of Barrett v Enfield LBC, which was decided in 1999, can also be found in the forty-ninth volume of the
Butterworths Medico-Legal Reports, beginning on page one.

Case citations including neutral citations

case name | [year] | court | number, | [year] OR (year) | volume |

report abbreviation | first page

Corr v IBC Vehicles Ltd [2008] UKHL 13, [2008] 1 AC 884

The example above indicates that the case involving Corr and IBC Vehicles Ltd was the thirteenth judgment
issued by the House of Lords in 2008, and that a report of the judgment can be found in volume one of the
2008 volume of the series of the Law Reports called the Appeal Cases, beginning at page 884.
Tips;
- A law report is a published report of a judgment, with additional fea-
tures such as a headnote summarising the facts of the case and the
judgment, catchwords used for indexing, and lists of cases considered.
- Neutral Citations are used for House of Lords, Privy Council, Court
of Appeal, Administrative Court and (post 2002) High Court judge-
ments in order to identify the judgment independently of any law re-
port. The court is not included in brackets at the end of a neutral cita-
tion because the neutral citation itself identifies the court. However,
neutral citations from the High Court do include the division in brack-
ets after the judgment number, e.g. (Admin).
- Care must be taken to avoid confusing neutral citations with the tra-
ditional type of citation as they will often appear together.
e.g. Campbell v Frisbee [2002] EWHC 328 [2002] E.M.L.R. 31
EWHC is the neutral citation
EMLR refers to the printed series
Entertainment and Media Law Reports.
- Indicate the court in brackets, (for cases
without a neutral citation or decided
before 1865), after the first page of the
report, and before the pinpoint if there is
one. Use (HL) for the House of Lords, (CA)
for the Court of Appeal, (QB), (Ch), and (F)
for the divisions of the High Court, and
(Com Ct) for the Commercial Court within
the Queen’s Bench Division.
- Always Italicise case names!
These are the neutral citation formats used for the different courts:
 EWCA Civ - Court of Appeal Civil Division
 EWCA Crim - Court of Appeal Criminal Division
 EWHC (Admin) - High Court (Administrative Court)
 EWHC (Ch) - High Court (Chancery Division)
 EWHC (QB) - High Court (Queen's Bench Division)
 EWHC (Comm) - High Court (Commercial Court)
 EWHC (Admlty) - High Court (Admiralty)
 EWHC (Fam) - High Court (Family Division)
 EWHC (Pat) - High Court (Patents Court)
 EWHC (TCC) - High Court (Technology & Construction Court)
 UKHL - House of Lords
 UKPC - Privy Council

Have a go using the examples on the next page

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4.

5.

Notes:
Names of Statutes
Cite an Act by its short title and year in roman, using capitals for the
major words, and without a comma before the year.

- Human Rights Act 1998

- Act of Supremacy 1558

Parts of Statutes
Statutes are divided into parts, sections, subsections, paragraphs
and subparagraphs. In addition, the main text of the statute may be
supplemented by schedules, which are divided into paragraphs and
subparagraphs. The relevant abbreviations are:

part/parts—pt/pts
section/sections—s/ss
subsection/subsections—sub-s/sub-ss
paragraph/paragraphs—para/paras
subparagraph/subparagraphs—subpara/subparas
schedule/schedules—sch/schs

If specifying a paragraph or subsection as part of a section however,

use only the abbreviation for the section.
- Criminal Attempts Act 1981, ss 1(1) and 4(3).
- Sexual Offences Act 2003, s 1(1)(c).
Statutory instruments (orders, regulations or rules)
These are numbered consecutively throughout the year. The year
combines with the serial number to provide an SI number that follows
the abbreviation ‘SI’ and which is used to identify the legislation.

- Penalties for Disorderly Behaviour (Amendment of Minimum Age)

Order 2004, SI 2004/3166
As this example shows, when citing a statutory instrument, give the
name, year and (after a comma) the SI number.

In addition to those given above for parts of statutes, use the follow-
ing abbreviations:
regulation/regulations—reg/regs
rule/rules—r/rr
article/articles—art/arts

Rules of Court
The Civil Procedure Rules (CPR) and their predecessors, the Rules of
the Supreme Court (RSC) and the County Court Rules (CCR), may be
cited without reference to their SI number or year. Cite all other
court rules in full as statutory instruments.

CPR 7
RSC Ord 24, r 14A
Additional Information;
- Cite a Bill by its title, the House in which it originated, the Parliamentary ses-
sion in brackets, and the running number assigned to it. Running numbers for
House of Commons Bills are put in square brackets; those for House of Lords
Bills are not. When a Bill is reprinted at any stage it is given a new running
number.
title | HC Bill | (session) | [number] OR title | HL Bill | (session) | number
- Consolidated Fund HC Bill (2008–09) [5]
- Academies HL Bill (2010-11) 1, cl 8(2)

Welsh measures are primary legislation of the Welsh Assembly. They are cit-
ed by short title and year, followed by the National Assembly of Wales Measure
(nawm or mccc) number in brackets.
- Learner Travel (Wales) Measure 2008 (nawm 2)
- Mesur Teithio gan Ddysgwyr (Cymru) 2008 (mccc 2)

Like UK Parliament statutes, Acts of the Scottish Parliament are cited by short
title and year. Each Act is also given an ‘asp’ number, consisting of a lower-case
abbreviation of the words ‘Act of the Scottish Parliament’ and a running num-
ber in the year (eg ‘asp 13’). For completeness the asp number should be given
after the year, in brackets.
Crofting Reform etc Act 2007 (asp 7)

When citing Acts of the former Parliament of Northern Ireland, put ‘NI’ in
brackets between the short title and the year. When citing Acts of the current
Northern Ireland Assembly, which was established in 1998, put ‘Northern Ire-
land’ in brackets between the short title and the year.
Poultry Improvement Act (NI) 1968
Presumption of Death Act (Northern Ireland) 2009
1.

2.
author, | title | (additional information, | edition, | publisher | year)
Cite the author’s name first, followed by a comma, and then the title of the
book in italics. Where a book has a title and subtitle not separated with punc-
tuation, insert a colon.
Publication information follows the title within brackets. Publication elements
should always include the publisher and the year of publication, with a space
but no punctuation between them. The place of publication need not be given.
If you are citing an edition other than the first edition, indicate that using the
form ‘2nd edn.’

Timothy Endicott, Administrative Law (OUP 2009)

Gareth Jones, Goff and Jones: The Law of Restitution (1st supp, 7th
edn, Sweet & Maxwell 2009)

Edited and translated books

If there is no author, cite the editor or translator as you would an author,
adding in brackets after their name ‘(ed)’ or ‘(tr)’, or ‘(eds)’ or ‘(trs)’ if there is
more than one.
Jeremy Horder (ed), Oxford Essays in Jurisprudence: Fourth Series
(OUP 2000)
Peter Birks and Grant McLeod (trs), The Institutes of Justinian
(Duckworth 1987)
If the work has an author, but an editor or translator is also acknowledged
on the front cover, cite the author in the usual way and attribute the editor or
translator at the beginning of the publication information, within the brackets.
HLA Hart, Punishment and Responsibility: Essays in the Philosophy of
Law (John Gardner ed, 2nd edn, OUP 2008)
K Zweigert and H Kötz, An Introduction to Comparative Law (Tony
Weir tr, 3rd edn, OUP 1998)
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5.
author, | ‘title’ | (year) | volume | journal name or abbreviation |
first page of article

When citing articles, give the author’s name first, followed by a com-
ma. Then give the title of the article, in roman within single quota-
tion marks. After the title, give the publication information in the fol-
lowing order;
- year of publication, in square brackets if it identifies the volume, in
round brackets if there is a separate volume number
- the volume number if there is one and issue if necessary
- the name of the journal in roman, in full or abbreviated form, with
no full stops and
- the first page of the article.

Paul Craig, ‘Theory, “Pure Theory” and Values in Public Law’ [2005]
PL 440
Alison L Young, ‘In Defence of Due Deference’ (2009) 72 MLR 554

Put a comma after the first page of the article if there is a pinpoint.

JAG Griffith, ‘The Common Law and the Political Constitu-

tion’ (2001) 117 LQR 42, 64
Jeremy Waldron, ‘The Core of the Case against Judicial Re-
view’ (2006) 115 Yale LJ 1346, 1372
Tips;
- Treat case notes with titles as if they were journal articles. Where
there is no title, use the name of the case in italics instead, and add
(note) at the end of the citation.

Andrew Ashworth, ‘R (Singh) v Chief Constable of the West Mid-

lands Police’ [2006] Crim LR 441 (note)

- Remember to take full stops out of abbreviations. Use the Cardiff

Index to Legal Abbreviations to search for the meaning of abbrevia-
tions for legal publications and/or search the titles of legal publica-
tions in order to find the correct abbreviation.
http://www.legalabbrevs.cardiff.ac.uk/

Have a go using the examples on the next page

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2.

3.
General Principles

author, | ‘title’ | (additional information, | publisher | year)

Where there is no relevant advice elsewhere in OSCOLA, follow the

general principles for secondary sources when citing secondary ma-
terials.

Websites and Blogs

author, | ‘title’ | (additional information, date of upload/

publication)| <URL>| date of access

When citing websites and blogs, if there is no author identified, and it

is appropriate to cite an anonymous source, begin the citation with
the title in the usual way. If there is no date of publication on the
website, give only the date of access.

Sarah Cole, ‘Virtual Friend Fires Employee’ (Naked Law, 1 May

2009) <http://www.nakedlaw.com/2009/05/index.html> ac-
cessed 19 November 2009
1.
Bibliographies

A bibliography listing primary and secondary sources should be pro-

vided after the main body of text and any appendices. It should in-
clude all such sources cited in the work and need not be indexed.
Items in bibliographies take the same form as all other citations in
OSCOLA, with three exceptions: (1) the author’s surname should pre-
cede his or her initial(s), with no comma separating them, but a com-
ma after the final initial; (2) only initials should be used, and not fore-
names; and (3) the titles of unattributed works should be preceded
by a double em-dash. Works should be arranged in alphabetical or-
der of author surname, with unattributed works being listed at the
beginning of the bibliography in alphabetical order of first major
word of the title.
CITATION in a footnote
15 Elizabeth Fisher, Risk Regulation and Administrative Con-
stitutionalism (Hart Publishing 2007).

CITATION in a bibliography
Fisher E, Risk Regulation and Administrative Constitutional-
ism (Hart Publishing 2007)
If citing several works by the same author in a bibliography, list the
author’s works in chronological order (starting with the oldest), and
in alphabetical order of first major word of the title within a single
year. After the citation of the first work, replace the author’s name
with a double em-dash.

Hart HLA, Law, Liberty and Morality (OUP 1963)

—— ‘Varieties of Responsibility’ (1967) 83 LQR 346

—— Punishment and Responsibility (OUP 1968)

Primary Sources
Table of Cases

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2.

3.
Table of Legislation

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2.

Secondary Sources
Journal Articles

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3.
All material re-produced in this leaflet has been shared and adapted from the Oxford Standard for
the Citation of Legal Authorities 4th edn, Hart 2012 in accordance with the Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.