Obama defeats our shameful libel laws
Peter Hoskin 4:17pm
Here's one divergence between the US and the UK where we can all get behind our American
brethren. Yesterday, Barack Obama signed into law a provision blocking his country's thinkers and writers
from foreign libel laws. The target is "libel tourism," by which complainants skip around the First Amendment by taking their cases to less conscientious countries. And by "less
conscientious countries," I mean, erm, here.
As various organisations have documented, not least the Index on Censorship, the libel laws in this country are a joke – and a pernicious one at that. Various dodgy figures have exploited them to effectively silence publications and individuals who, regardless of the facts of the case, face hefty pay-outs unless they submit. And others, one suspects, have been emboldened by just how easy it is. Would Alan Sugar, for instance, have threatened Quentin Letts if our libel laws weren't so heavily weighted against the media? Would Charlie Whelan have pressured The Spectator? I doubt it. And, alas, the upshot of all this is a casual erosion of freedom of speech.
Happily, the coalition is resolved to reform the country's libel laws. This latest sign of just how those laws are regarded internationally should remind them how important – and necessary – that effort is.
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Occasional Ostrich
August 11th, 2010 4:26pm Report this commentNice one, Barack! (and that's the first time I've said that!) Surely this will act as the necessary 'cattle prod' to shock some sense of urgency into our recalcitrant legal system.
Victor Southern
August 11th, 2010 4:34pm Report this commentMuch overdue to be done here.
yank
August 11th, 2010 5:11pm Report this commentTake that, you limey fascists. ;-)
But seriously, good on ya', Mr. Hoskin. This recent business seems an aberration, and I'd presume a quick restoration is at hand.
People of tolerance and good will, as over there on the pile of rocks, will likely never settle for less.
It's really too bad Dave didn't stay the US' hand on this, and preempt us, or rather allow the people of the UK to preempt us. For that failure, that political censorship, that void of leadership, we can blame Dave, Congress, Obama, Blair, Brown... all of them. We should all expect more.
Chuck Unsworth
August 11th, 2010 6:11pm Report this commentSackcloth and ashes and Schillings and Carter Ruck, then. Excellent news.
Michael
August 11th, 2010 6:46pm Report this commentAnd as one reads of yet another incident where travellers have moved into private land, one realises that there are many laws, mainly associated with 'human rights' that need immediate abolition. What happened to the great repeal act. Ah. Too many lawyers with a finger in the highly remunerative pie.
Rhoda Klapp
August 11th, 2010 6:58pm Report this commentI find myself not worried by what you might write which would cause you to be sued. I do worry that stuff doesn't get into the Spectator because it isn't pc or goes against some sort of editorial policy not to stray too far from wetness. But that's just me, and I don't understand why the defence of truth is not good enough. (I do understand and deprecate the expense of litigation, but that is something which could be fixed without changing the libel law).
dearieme
August 11th, 2010 7:04pm Report this comment"..one divergence between the US and the UK..": when people say "UK" when they mean England, it's usually because they are discussing some horrible shortcoming in English law. cf "British justice".
Cato
August 11th, 2010 7:11pm Report this commentAgreed, generally, but please don't let this go too far. The U.S. laws are dangerously unbalanced in the other direction. As long as someone can be shown to be a "public figure," the media can essentially write or say anything they want about a person, true or false. And courts have allowed some rather bizarre circular logic to be applied in determining if someone is a public figure--more or less "if I'm writing about him he must be a public figure otherwise I wouldn't be writing about him."
AndyLeeds
August 11th, 2010 7:29pm Report this commentNot sure I see how you can do this. If a British Subject is libelled in a book written by a US writer, but published in the UK by an American publisher it would still be actionable in the UK Courts, and rightly so.
I'll have more time for the US when we have reciprocity in extradition, they stop their 'judicial Imperialism, and have more respect for foreign legislatures viz-a-via the Lockerbie matter.
TomTom
August 11th, 2010 7:44pm Report this commentThe McLibel Case showed just how bizarre English libel law is by letting a corporation use libel laws to silence critics. There never seems to be any impetus for politicians to reform the law and point out it contravenes the ECHR in reality but lawyers just love it for the fat fees and easy ride the plaintiff has in not having to prove anything whatsoever
David Booth
August 11th, 2010 8:13pm Report this commentFor all his faults, and there are many, President Obama is spot on with this change to the American legal system.
Fancy passing a law to protect the people of your own country! Lets hope it catches on over here.
Edward
August 11th, 2010 8:40pm Report this commentCan any legal types tell us what this means in practice?
Does this mean I could go to America, publish a book (or blog) which somebody here would consider libellous, and yet remain out of the reach of the British courts
2trueblue
August 12th, 2010 9:15am Report this commentAndyLeeds, Indeed. Where is our reciprocity in extradition?
Could it be that it just suits Obama right now? There is more to this than meets the eye right now.
Occasional Ostrich
August 12th, 2010 1:16pm Report this commentAndyLeeds, yup,it's quite galling to hear the conceit of a bunch of purblind US Senators, who wouldn't be making the asinine statements or the unseemly demands they do unless they genuinely believed that a US global hegemony actually exists already. (or they might just be playing to the voters in the run up to the mid-term elections?)
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