Media law is ever changing and this index will strive to keep you abreast of developments in this complex and important area of journalism.
Our fortnightly column looking at the latest law issues, written by specialist media lawyers from Foot Anstey, also appears here.
Two 15-year-old boys have been named by the Bolton Evening News after a Crown Court judge heard from one of its reporters. The boys, who had committed three street robberies including one where another boy was threatened with a screwdriver,
A reporter who stood up in court to challenge a media ban on naming the defendant has won the right to publish. Carl Walker questioned Jersey magistrates about their decision to place a blanket ban on identifying a woman who
The Oldham Evening Chronicle has won the right to name a woman who left her three-year-old daughter home alone, after it persuaded a judge to overturn a section 39 order. The newspaper argued that because of the serious nature of
The Western Morning News has won its secrecy battle with the Government over making public a report into repairs to a leaky tunnel at the gateway to Cornwall. The row blew up when a local MP found that a Highways
A reporter from the Bucks Free Press has successfully challenged an application for a section 39 order that would have made reporting of a case of a mother who had failed to send her daughter to school impossible. Solicitors at
The Lord Chief Justice has warned journalists that mis-reporting events in the courts can damage public confidence in the criminal justice system. Lord Woolf said he sympathised with the journalists’ balancing act between reporting what they felt the public wanted
Solicitors acting for a 17-year-old boy abandoned their battle to make his identity secret, when the judge revealed that he agreed with the North West Evening Mail – that the youth should be named. The teenager, Daniel Green, of Hartington
The Evening Chronicle in Newcastle has won the right to name a 15-year-old boy who has been jailed for life for raping a middle-aged woman. Court reporter Garry Willey successfully appealed for a Section 39 order not to be imposed
Havant Borough Council has failed in an attempt to block The News from publishing the pictures of three town hall staff who were made redundant. After the Portsmouth newspaper printed photographs of the three axed council directors, whose departures could
A shake-up of preliminary law exams for students under the National Council for the Training of Journalists will come into effect from September, with a more demanding set of papers. The changes will be discussed at a law seminar, with
The Western Morning News has issued a legal challenge to the Government over its attempt to “cover up” a secret report. Transport Minister David Jamieson has refused to publish a document commissioned by the Highways Agency about the Saltash Tunnel
The Peterborough Evening Telegraph has won a court case after the judge threw out a claim that the paper identified a youth responsible for a vicious assault on a pensioner. The decision to go to court has been attacked by
The Government is being urged to remove an amendment to the Sexual Offences Bill which would provide anonymity for rape defendants. Clause Two of the bill, which is currently passing through the Commons, would allow those charged with rape the
An Arab leader has dropped his appeal against the lifting of reporting restrictions on a case concerning arms cash deposits by the Middle Eastern state of Qatar. In December the Jersey Evening Post won a battle to persuade the Royal
The Plymouth Evening Herald has lost its appeal against a court ruling which said a photograph it published identified a 15-year-old boy even though it was partially blacked out. In January the paper was fined £1,500 after it was found
The name of a youth who was handed Grimsby’s first anti-social behaviour order has been revealed in the press thanks to a legal challenge from the Evening Telegraph. Magistrates ruled it would be in the public interest to identify him,