OSCOLA Referencing

Format

Journal Article

Print:

Author, 'Title of Journal Article' [year] Journal Name or Abbreviation First page of article. 

Print with volume:

Author, 'Title of Journal Article' (year) volume Journal Name or Abbreviation First page of article. 

Online:

Author, 'Title of Journal Article' (year) volume (issue) Journal Name or Abbreviation <web address> date accessed

Rules for Journal Articles:

• Cite author's name first, followed by a comma.
• Then give the title of the article, within single quotation marks. 
• After the title, give the publication information. 
• Year of publication in round brackets, then the volume number. If there is NO volume number, use square brackets [1985] for the date. 
• Name of the journal in full or abbreviated form, with no full stops. Capitalise all of the major words in the title. Do not use full stops in abbreviations or within the title of the journal. 
• Give the first page of the article. 
• For online journal articles, cite in the same way as print articles but follow the citation with the web address and the date you most recently accessed the article. 
• If both online source and print copy are available, follow the referencing style for the print copy version.
• If volume and/or page numbers are not yet known, simply omit that information. 
• Citations of publications that are available only electronically should end with the web address (or 'url') in angled brackets (<>, followed by the date of most recent access.
• Date of accessed should be expressed in the form 'accessed 1 January 2018'.
• Include 'http://' only if the web address does not begin with 'www'.

Format

Newspaper Article

Printed:

Author, 'Title within single quotation marks' the Name of the Newspaper in italics [city of publication, date of publication]  page number on which the article was published, if known.

Online Newspaper article:

Author, 'Title within single quotation marks' the Name of the Newspaper in italics [city of publication, date of publication]  <web address> date accessed

Format

Conference Paper

Print:

Author, 'Title of Conference Paper' (The Conference title, location and date of the conference)  

Online:

Author, 'Title of Conference Paper' (The Conference title, location and date of the conference) <web address> date accessed

Rules for Conference Papers:

• Title in quotation marks '   '.
• In bracket (  ) the title, location and date of the conference.
• Conference papers available online should include web address and date of access.
• If available in print and online version, cite the print version.

Format

Websites and Blogs

Author, 'Title of Article' (Name or Abbreviation of blog or website, date year) <web address> date accessed

Format

Legislation

Legislation title [Year] Name or Abbreviation of Legislation issue/first page

Format

Case Law

Names of parties involved [Year] Volume number Abbreviation for name/title Page of report/case number Court

Rules for Case Law:

• Year in square brackets if the year identifies the volume
• Do not use full stops in abbreviations.
• 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. 
• The numbers at the end are called 'pinpoints'. Pinpoints give the paragraph number or page number to the citations.

Case Names

• if there are multiple parties, name only the first claimant and first defendant
• If the parties are individual, omit forenames and initials.
• Abbreviated common words and phrases. 

Round brackets or square brackets? 

Square brackets are used for law reports series where it is necessary to know the year to locate the case. These law report series may publish a volume 1, 2, 3 and so on every year or they may not use volume numbers at all. 

Round brackets are used for law reports series where it is not necessary to know the year to locate the case. These law report series may use continual volume and/or page numbers in their publications. i.e. they never start again at volume 1 or page 1 at the beginning of the year, the continue  where they left off the previous year.

Activity: Case Citation using OSCOLA

https://xerte.cardiff.ac.uk/play_6716#page13

Neutral Citation

A neutral citation is made up of three parts:

1. the year the case was heard,
2. the court, and
3. the case number

In a neutral citation, the abbreviated court name will start with 'UK' or 'EW' to indicate that the court's jurisdiction extends to the United Kingdom or England and Wales. Keeping this in mind, can help you to distinguish between neutral citations and law report citations.

Cases which have been heard since 2001 will have a neutral citation which indicates in which court the case was heard.

Law Report vs Neutral Citation? 

The Law Report identifies what you have read, whereas the neutral citation is the same regardless of source 

To correctly cite case using OSCOLA, need both the Law Report and Neutral Citation

Examples of Neutral Citation

• Supreme Court - [2010] UKSC 2
• House of Lords - [2008] UKHL 8 
• Court of Appeal (Civil Division) - [2001] EWCA Civ 5 
• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) - [2001] EWCA Crim 7
• High Court (Administrative Court) - [2005] EWHC Admin 12
• High Court (Chancery Division) - [2005] EWHC 15 (Ch)
• High Court (Queen Bench Division) - [2005] EWHC 18 (QB)
• High Court (Family Division) - [2005] EWHC 24 (Fam)

How to cite Statutes

• Cite the short ACT TITLE in both Footnote and Bibliography

          Example: Bacon Industry Act 1938

          Footnote/Bibliography : Bacon Industry Act 1938, s53

• Pinpoint the section.

• If you give the full party names in the text, you don't need to repeat the party names in the footnote. 

Pinpoint

A pinpoint is where you need to refer to a particular page, paragraph or section of a source. Then go in your footnotes.

The pinpoint is usually to a page number, but if a case has numbered paragraph, use the paragraph number instead. Paragraph numbers should be indicated by square brackets, except for EU cases.

if the basic citation ends with a number you need a comma before the pinpoint as below:

Examples: 

How to cite International and Foreign Materials

International means between nations. Foreign means belonging to one nation.

To cite International legal materials, refer to the 2006 edition of the OSCOLA handbook. These are not covered in the 12 edition. See the section 4.3 appendix of the OSCOLA handbook for guides or on other jurisdictions. 

Foreign Legal Materials

When citing Foreign materials, cite primary sources as in their home jurisdiction. 

Drop the full stops in any abbreviations when citing foreign materials.

Law Reports 

A law report is a published report of a judgement, containing additional information and facts relating to the case.

Judgements may be reported by any number of law reports. However, some series are regarded as more authoritative than others. The Law Reports series is seen as the most authoritative as the text is approved by both counsel and the judge before publication. 

You should always cite the most authoritative series which has reported the case. 

Here is the commonly recognised order of authority, with most authoritative at the top of the list: 

• The Law reports (AC, QB, Ch, Fam)
• Weekly Law Reports (WLR) or All England Law Reports (All ER)
• Specialist law reports, for example Lloyds Law Reports (Lloyd's Rep), Industrial Cases Reports (ICR), Medical Law reports (Med LR) or Criminal Appeal Reports (Cr App R).

All journal and newspaper reports are summaries, so should only be cited if the decision is not available in a law report series.

In England and Wales, the LAW REPORTS series published by Incorporated Council of Law Reporting (www.lawreports.co.uk) are regarded as the most authoritative reports. 

in Malaysia, MALAYAN LAW JOURNAL is a general series of law reports, providing reports of cases from the Federal Court, the Court of Appeal and High Court. 

Activity: Referencing using OSCOLA for Law Report 

https://xerte.cardiff.ac.uk/play_6716#page15

Bibliography

• You should create a bibliography at the end of your work that lists all of the sources used in your work.
• Each source only needs to be listed once, even if you have referred to it multiple times in your work.
• Do not include background reading in your bibliography.
• The bibliography should appear after the text and after appendices.
• The bibliography should list the sources in alphabetical order.

• If your piece of work is long, you can divide the bibliography into three sections: Cases, Legislation, and Bibliography