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The media has enjoyed notable victories for press freedom in the last few weeks.

The Law Lords breathed new life into the Reynolds defence of qualified privilege for “responsible journalism” on matters of genuine public interest.

In Jameel & Another v Wall Street Journal Europe, they signalled that lower courts had been interpreting Lord Nicholls’ well-known 10-point test from the Reynolds case far too restrictively.

The decision in Jameel is exceptionally important. Its effect is already being seen in the way publishers formulate contentious articles and deal with complaints.

And in Norfolk County Council v Webster & Others, Mr Justice Munby agreed to lift the reporting restrictions which usually apply when a court is considering the upbringing of children. As a result, reports of care proceedings were permitted where parents claimed they had been the victims of a miscarriage of justice on the basis of flawed medical evidence which they alleged wrongly suggested their children had been physically abused.

Meanwhile, other cases have confirmed the onward march of privacy laws.

In X and Y v Persons Unknown, Mr Justice Eady refused an application by media organisations to lift an injunction preventing publication of information about the state of a well-known model’s marriage.

And in CC v AB, the same judge ruled that a betrayed husband, whose wife had an affair, may owe a duty of confidence to the adulterer and the adulterer’s family not to tell anyone about it.

He imposed an interim injunction banning the aggrieved husband from selling the story to the media or publishing details.

It is perhaps the high-water mark of privacy laws being developed by judges to protect people’s right to privacy under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Although the judge analysed the law of confidence and privacy at length, the actual injunction was made under the Protection from Harassment Act.

The trend builds on Eady J’s ruling in December 2005, upheld by the Court of Appeal on December 14 2006, that folk singer Loreena McKennitt was entitled to damages and an injunction after details of her private life were revealed in a book.

That appeal ruling had been keenly awaited, especially as some commentators had described as “anodyne” many of the published details which the judge deemed objectionable.

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To contact Tony Jaffa or Nigel Hanson telephone 0800 0731 411 or e-mail [email protected] or [email protected]

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