PRESS FREEDOM ENHANCED

by RAY FLEMING
A major reinforcement of the freedom of the press in Britain will be the result of a landmark House of Lords ruling this week.
The phrase “innocent until proven guilty” is always thought of as a bedrock of British law and freedom. Curiously, however, although it has applied to every citizen one important segment of British life has not enjoyed its protection. In libel cases the assumption “guilty until proven innocent” has been the rule for the media. In other words newspapers sued for libel have been required to prove every detail of what they had written while the plaintiff has been assumed to be innocent of any accusation made against him or her. This unreal situation has been cynically exploited by people wanting to scare the media away from potentially damaging stories simply by threatening to sue for libel. The new ruling concerned a libel case defended by The Wall Street Journal Europe in which the plaintif was successful in two lower courts but failed when the newspaper persisted on appeal to the House of Lords. The five Law Lords agreed that the “public interest” defence should be paramount provided that the media organisation acted fairly and responsibly in gathering and publishing the information; it did not matter that not every detail had been proved to be true. The beneficial result of this important ruling is likely to be much bolder and insistent investigative reporting by the media into British public life.