Law Reports: AAUA Don advocates special compensation for Judges

….Says private publishers profit from Court Judgments

A legal scholar, Dr Akin Oluwadayisi  has proposed a new compensation structure for judges, arguing that private publishers of law reports should contribute a portion of their profits to support judicial welfare.

The recommendation is in response to the growing concern over the commercial use of court judgments without financial benefits accruing to judges who are the original authors.

Dr. Oluwadayisi, a senior lecturer and Head of Department of Jurisprudence and International Law, Adekunle Ajasin University Akungba-Akoko, Ondo State, made the call while delivering a paper at the All Universities’ Law Librarian Workshop/Conference, organised by the Council of Legal Education at the Nigerian Law School, Abuja, on Wednesday, July 20, 2025.

He noted that while court judgments are typically considered public documents and can be freely reproduced under the fair use doctrine, the intellectual labour involved in crafting these judgments is often overlooked.

He pointed out that many judgments run into hundreds or even thousands of pages and require intense legal reasoning and effort, yet judges rarely receive recognition or compensation for this work in the commercial domain.

Dr Oluwadayisi contended that publishing houses are repackaging court rulings into profitable legal reports, with no structured mechanism for giving back to the judiciary or the retired judges who authored them.

He advocated the introduction of a special fund sourced through mandatory contributions from legal publishing firms, modelled after existing frameworks such as the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund).

The scholar suggested a levy of between 3 to 5 per cent on the profits of legal publishing firms, which would go towards a retirement fund or welfare package for judicial officers.

Beyond economic concerns, Dr. Oluwadayisi also raised concerns about the impact of electronic law report publishing on research in law, particularly for undergraduate long essays, master’s dissertations and PhD theses that were subjected to plagiarism checks and Turnitin.

He lamented that judgments written by judges, who are public officers, are increasingly becoming the “copyright” of electronic law reporters rather than the court when legal writings are made to pass through plagiarism checks.