A council has failed in its bid to gag a local editor over documents he published that had appeared on the authority’s own website.

A judge at the Royal Courts of Justice has ruled in favour of Steven Downes, who edits Inside Croydon, after Croydon London Borough Council carried out its threat to try and obtain a High Court injunction.

However, Steven, who represented himself in court, did give an undertaking to the court not to publish anything further from the documents.

HTFP reported on Wednesday how the council had made the threat after publishing details on its website of an investigation into the authority’s financial collapse in 2020.

Inside Croydon came into possession of two supposedly “highly confidential and exempt” documents relating to the investigation, known as the Penn Report, after the council published them on its own website in September.

According to Inside Croydon’s report of proceedings at the court, pictured, Mr Justice Nicklin ruled on the matter on Thursday and likened the council’s application for a gagging order to “trying to put the genie back in the bottle”.

The judge added: “It’s a bit of a stretch that you can keep a secret when it’s been seen by 16,000 people.”

Mr Justice Nicklin also refused the council’s application for third-party injunctions – meaning that others who have the documents may publish them – and made no order that Inside Croydon would have to remove the stories it had already published.

Speaking to HTFP, Steven said: “Today is two years to the day since Croydon Council went bust. In all that time, Croydon Council has initiated more legal action to gag the press than they have against the people who bankrupted the borough.”

A Croydon Council spokesperson told HTFP: “Two confidential reports were automatically published online following an unknown software error – both reports were removed within two hours of being notified of their release.

“Given the reports contained confidential legal advice relating to ongoing matters, the council took legal action to protect the confidentiality of this advice.

“We have taken the necessary steps to avoid any recurrence and have also notified the software provider who are addressing the issue.”