Cross-Examination

The Ministry of Justice's own Civil Procedure Rules glossary gives the concise official definition: cross-examination is 'Questioning of a witness by a party other than the party who called the witness.' It is deliberately defined against its counterpart, 'evidence in chief' — 'The evidence given by a witness for the party who called him' — because the two stages serve opposite purposes: one side draws out the witness's account, the other tests it.

In criminal trials, cross-examination is handled with particular care where the witness is vulnerable, such as a child. CPS guidance on video-recorded evidence notes that where a young witness views their recorded interview separately from the jury, best practice (drawing on the Equal Treatment Benchbook) is that 'the young witness should be sworn immediately before cross-examination and then asked if they have watched the video recorded interview and if its contents are true' — an example of how procedure adapts the basic right to challenge a witness's evidence to the witness's own needs.