(1) Subject to subsection (2) and notwithstanding any other enactment, the Chief Executive Officer of the Courts Service may, where he or she considers it appropriate, having regard to the benefit of information being made available to the public in an electronic form and the capacity for a register to be maintained in such form, issue a direction in writing that the register shall be maintained in electronic form.

(2) Where the Chief Executive Officer of the Courts Service issues a direction under subsection(1), he or she shall specify in the direction -

(a) the date from which the register to which it relates shall be maintained in electronic form, and

(b) whether that register shall, from that date, be so maintained in respect of -

(i) all matters registered in that register after that date, or

(ii) all matters registered in that register from such earlier date as that Chief Executive may specify.

(3) A direction under subsection (1) shall be published on the website of the Courts Service, but failure to so publish shall not affect the validity of the direction concerned.