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King's Guide to Referencing

Primary sources

Cases in England and Wales

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

Case citations are usually made up of three elements: the case name, the neutral citation and the law report. This case citation tells us that the judgment in Corr v IBC Vehicles Ltd was issued in 2008 by the House of Lords. It was the 13th judgment issued by the House of Lords that year. The second half of the citation tells us that a report of this judgment is located in volume 1 of the 2008 edition of the series of the Law Reports called the Appeal Cases, starting on page 884.

Neutral citations were only introduced in the UK in the early 2000s so many older cases (and those from some lower courts) may not have a neutral citation. This is how to reference cases without a neutral citation:

1 Page v Smith [1996] AC 155 (HL)

This case citation tells us that the judgment in Page v Smith was reported in the 1996 edition of the series of the Law Reports called the Appeal Cases, starting on page 155.

UK Primary legislation

1 Human Rights Act 1998

Book

In-text citation

1 Howard Davis, Human Rights Law (Oxford University Press 2016) 217

In the footnote include page numbers identifying the specific pages the ideas you are referencing come from at the end. In this example, the page number is 217.

Bibliography

Davis H, Human Rights Law (Oxford University Press 2016)

Chapter in a book

In-text citation

1 Tullio Treves and Cesare Pitea, 'Piracy, International Law and Human Rights' in Nihal Bhuta (ed) The Frontiers of Human Rights: Extraterritoriality and its Challenges (Oxford University Press 2016)

Bibliography

Treves T and Pitea C, 'Piracy, International Law and Human Rights' in N Bhuta (ed), The Frontiers of Human Rights: Extraterritoriality and its Challenges (Oxford University Press 2016)

Journal article

In-text citation

1 Aoife Daly, "Climate Competence: Youth Climate Activism and Its Impact on International Human Rights Law" (2022) 22(2) HRL Rev 1, 3

Bibliography

Daly A, "Climate Competence: Youth Climate Activism and Its Impact on International Human Rights Law" (2022) 22(2) HRL Rev 1

In the footnote include page numbers at the end identifying the first page of the article, followed by the specific page the ideas you are referencing come from. In the bibliography include the number of the first page. In this example, the first page number is 1.

Chapter in a book

In-text citation

1 Tullio Treves and Cesare Pitea, 'Piracy, International Law and Human Rights' in Nihal Bhuta (ed) The Frontiers of Human Rights: Extraterritoriality and its Challenges (Oxford University Press 2016)

Bibliography

Treves T and Pitea C, 'Piracy, International Law and Human Rights' in N Bhuta (ed), The Frontiers of Human Rights: Extraterritoriality and its Challenges (Oxford University Press 2016)

Generative AI

King's has produced new student guidance on the use of generative AI tools. Students are not expected to reference generative AI but are expected to acknowledge its use through a statement. Please see the central Student Guidance for details. 

Bibliographies

You need to provide a list of the sources you have used. In the OSCOLA style this is called a Bibliography. It is arranged in alphabetical order of author's surname:

 

Bibliography:

Bailey J, Construction Law (Routledge 2016)

Daly A, "Climate Competence: Youth Climate Activism and Its Impact on International Human Rights Law" (2022) 22(2) HRL Rev 1

Finch E and Fafinski S, Legal Skills (4th edn, Oxford University Press 2021)

Fisher E, Risk Regulation and Administrative Constitutionalism (Hart Publishing 2007)

Full guide to OSCOLA

Referencing e-learning course

Add footnotes to your document

For guidance on adding footnotes to your document, select one of the options below: