---

There is simply nothing to discuss as far as another recent victory for privacy over free speech is concerned.

That’s the stark view of the House of Lords Appeal Committee, which rejected author Niema Ash’s bid to appeal against a Court of Appeal ruling that she infringed the privacy of folk-singer Loreena McKennitt by revealing biographical details in a book.

Remarkably, the case established that it is now “generally regarded as unacceptable” to publish without permission even relatively trivial details about an individual’s private life, including such anodyne information as the décor and layout of a home.

Dismissing Ash’s appeal petition, the Appeal Committee said the case did not “raise an arguable point of law of general public importance which ought to be considered by the House at this time”.

With English law’s pro-privacy approach clearly entrenched, Ash was reported to be taking her appeal to the European Court.

It came as Prince Charles’ lawyers are trying to get a quick ‘summary judgment’ to protect his privacy in relation to copies of seven leaked journals held by the Mail on Sunday.

The case stands adjourned to May 21 after the MoS argued it needed time to file evidence on public interest issues and was still in the process of applying to the House of Lords for permission to appeal the Court of Appeal’s previous ruling against it.

Such costly litigation in the courts could be abandoned by libel claimants if they take their cue from snooker player Peter Ebdon.

He recently went to binding arbitration with The Times over an article by Matthew Syed that said his extremely slow play in beating Ronnie O’Sullivan in the quarter-final of the Embassy World Championship in 2005 could be seen as “cheating”.

Handing victory to The Times, arbitrator Sir Peter Brooke decided the article “set out in some detail the facts on which his opinion was based” and amounted to fair comment.

Meanwhile back in the courts, a libel jury’s higher-than-expected award of £75,000 to Tony Purnell, former Principal of Jaguar Racing Formula 1 team, for vindication and injury to feelings and reputation following a defamatory article published in Business F1 magazine, has been upheld by the Court of Appeal.

The trial judge had suggested a bracket of £25,000 to £60,000.

The appeal issue was whether the trial judge had been wrong to allow the jury to award Purnell damages for vindication.

The defendants argued that Purnell had already achieved vindication at a previous hearing when their justification defence was ‘struck out’ as being unfounded – that is, when the judge made a formal ruling that the defendants had no grounds for saying their defamatory statements about Purnell were true.

The appeal court decided a reasoned ‘strike out’ ruling could provide vindication, but it was likely to be marginal.

In the particular circumstances – where the defendants had tried to side-step the prior ruling by suggesting to the jury that the libel was true – there could be no criticism of the judge’s approach or the jury’s award.

---

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

---