Last night’s Big Libel Gig was really quite special. We’ll be posting videos of interviews with some of the artists involved soon, and the Little Atoms radio show recorded a special show on the night. In the meantime, here are Robert Sharp of English PEN’s excellent photographs.
The Libel Reform Campaign’s Libel Week culminates with the Big Libel Gig this Sunday, featuring Dara O’Briain, Robin Ince, Ed Byrne, Shappi Khorsandi, Tim Minchin and many more. We’ll be tweeting at #libelreform, and the Little Atoms radio show will be interviewing performers backstage for a special podcast, available next week.
On Thursday night, the campaign hosted “What You Don’t Get To See” at the Free Word Centre, an event highlighting the difficulties documentary filmmakers face because of England’s libel laws.
Among the speakers was investigative journalist Duncan Campbell, who ran a campaign against quackery in the 1980’s and 90s.
Campbell began investigating alternative health during the early day’s of Aids when, as he put it stories “filled my in-tray and broke my heart.” He investigated doctors selling unscientific remedy’s for the Big three” cancer, aids, leaukemia” Campbell’s investigations resulted in four doctors being struck off for life — two of whom were treating HIV-positive patients with Ayurvedic remedies. He repeatedly faced libel actions — including one against him personally
On Wednesday evening, Mr Juctice Eady spoke on free speech and the European Convention on Human Rights at the launch of City University’s Centre for Law, Justice and Journalism. Eady, often cast as the pantomime villain of defamation, said he felt the biggest problem with English free speech cases is the massive cost, which he felt was partly down to a culture of bravado and machismo among libel lawyers. Eady also said he was sympathetic to the idea of libel tribunals, which would save time and money.
You can read Justice Eady’s speech here
Meanwhile, this week Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky this week won a case against Russian channel RTR Planeta, which had implicated him in the death of Alexander Litvinenko. The case threw up a question: was this libel tourism? Berezovksy cleary has interests in the UK, but the broadcast was in Russian; and while available in the UK, it was not intended for this market.
Index on Censorship today welcomes the Justice Secretary’s decision to cut lawyers’ fees dramatically in ‘no win no fee’ defamation cases, but warns that costs are only one part of a libel system in need of serious reform
Justice Secretary Jack Straw announced last night (03 Mar) that he will cut the amount that lawyers can claim in “success fees” in defamation cases from 100 per cent of costs to 10 per cent.
Straw said:“Reducing the success fees charged by lawyers in no-win, no-fee defamation cases will help level the playing field so that scientists, journalists and writers can continue to publish articles which are in the public interest without incurring such disproportionate legal bills.”
The Ministry of Justice amendment was made by statutory order yesterday and will come into effect from April this year.
English PEN and Index on Censorship’s report on libel law, “Free Speech is Not for Sale” recommended capping base costs and making success fees and After the Event insurance non-recoverable.
John Kampfner, Chief Executive of Index on Censorship says the move is a welcome step on the road to libel reform.
He said:
“Our libel courts should be concerned to secure fairness for all, not to reward those with large pockets. It is now up to the legal profession to adapt to the new circumstances to ensure access to justice for claimants and defendants alike.”
Jo Glanville, Editor of Index on Censorship and member of the Ministry of Justice working party on libel reform said:
“We’re delighted that the Justice Secretary has addressed one of the most significant chills on free speech by slashing success fees in ‘no win, no fee’ cases – one of the key demands in our libel reform campaign with English PEN. While conditional fee agreements were introduced to provide access to justice, they had the unintended effect of in fact reducing access for newspapers, publishers and NGOs who could not afford to defend a libel action against a claimant lawyer on a CFA.”
In a major report, MPs’ have urged the government address the “mismatch in resources between wealthy corporations and impecunious defendants”, to find ways of limiting the cost of libel actions and to end the “embarrassment” of libel tourism. The select committee also made a series of recommendations on improving the self-regulation of the Press, increasing the number of lay members on the Press Complaints Commission and giving the regulator powers to fine or suspend publications.
But how do experts see the proposals?
Emily Bell is director of digital content for Guardian News and Media
I’ve mixed feelings about the report, on one level its fantastic, it is a vindication of the Guardian’s investigation into the phone hacking, and it also makes some sensible suggestions on libel. As a web editor I have concerns because the report is rooted in old media, in newspapers. The committee’s web comments proposals underestimate how onerous and expensive a moderation operation is to run. The proposals could damage an already fragile economic model. How would the committee define a publication? Would bloggers be forced to moderate comments on their site, will this affect networks like Facebook.
The real problem is that the sands seem to constantly shift beneath us as individual members of the judiciary set legal precedent. At least the committee’s proposal for a one-year time limit would remove the dangers of the newspapers archives counting as continuous publication.
Alan Rusbridger is Editor of the Guardian
I would have been happier if the committee had gone the Australian route and barred larger corporations for suing for libel except where deliberate malice could be shown. But, failing that, I think it would certainly be an improvement for the burden of proof to be reversed, and for a capping of costs.
Camilla Wright is founder and Editor of Popbitch
The report seems to be making all the right noises to fall into step with current fashion without any making any real attempt to guide how any effective change might happen. The call to overhaul libel laws, particularly in relation to costs and libel tourism obviously reached a tipping point some time ago, so the House of Commons is really just playing catch up, although the suggestion that journalists’ burden of proof might not be so onerous in cases of corporate defamation is very interesting.
In respect to privacy issues – such a hugely important area of law since the rich and famous started using Article 8 to keep media noses out of any parts of their lives they didn’t want – there’s nothing substantive coming out of this report except the point very firmly made that parliament wants nothing to do with legislating to sort out the current freedom of expression vs right to privacy bunfight.
Where the report makes some very hardline recommendations is on forcing newspapers to take responsibility for user-generated material – most specifically comments. It smashes apart the convention that this responsibility only really kicks in when the newspaper has been made aware of a complaint and instead puts the onus on the newspaper to make sure that comments contain nothing “offensive”. Well, one person’s offensive is another person’s joke or discussion point, so for me this would sound the death knell for online comments. While your first thought might be “Who would miss them?”, by taking away such a simple mechanism for readers to debate and interact with the newspapers we might weaken the attempt to improve levels of trust between the public and media.
Lord Lester QC is a human rights lawyer and Liberal Democrat peer
I welcome the report in seeking to strike a fair balance between free speech reputation and personal privacy. I will introduce a private members bill to give effect to some of the committee’s recommendations.
Charmian Gooch is a founder and director of Global Witness
The tone and direction of this report is broadly welcome, and some of the specific recommendations are good. However it will be a challenge to make sure that the Government can follow up on the many recommended consultations. We face threats on a regular basis and so had hoped for more concrete recommendations to protect campaigning organisations working on public interest issues. The decision not to recommend mandatory pre-notification is welcome, however we are concerned that the ‘public interest’ test is not clearly defined and may enable corrupt dictators to obstruct our exposés into their dirty dealings. The sort of responsible, fact-based campaigning we do is under threat, and this report does not do enough to redress that. Without further concrete reform, some of the world’s most egregious individuals will still be able to exploit the justice system to launder their reputations and defend their continuing corrupt activity.
Andrew Scott is a senior lecturer in law at the London School of Economics
On privacy and libel, the report is quite the curate’s egg. On the down-side, the committee has bought a pup on the ‘libel tourism’ issue. The only context in which libel tourism is a concern is where it overlaps with the chilling effect wrought by abusive actions brought to silence relatively weak defendants. For such defendants, the key problem is a combination of sheer cost and personal hassle. It is surprising that the committee should seek to validate the lobbying success of American mass-media organisations which, under the guise of concern for impecunious defendants, have moved to insulate themselves at home from liability for damage to individual reputations caused by publications made abroad. The better route is to focus attention on libel costs and procedures in the hope of reducing the burdens faced by all parties, to contemplate changes to rules on internet archives and corporate standing, and to introduce the right for defendants to counter-sue where libel is misused to silence them. In many of these respects, the committee’s reflections are eminently sensible.
On the up-side, the report offers a robust defence of media freedom against the seductive logic that underpins the privacy-based insistence on prior-notification. While Max Mosley can be forgiven for not seeing beyond the end of his own nose, the rest of us must properly take into account the deleterious impact that his siren calls could have on public knowledge of important matters. Nonetheless, the committee is right to call for responsibility at the pre-publication stage, and heavy culpability for error if and when things go inexcusably wrong.