Opinion: “Gary Flood v Times Newspapers” – William Bennett

The Court of Appeal decision in Gary Flood v The Times ([2010] EWCA Civ 804) has been portrayed as a blow to the Reynolds defence and to investigative journalism.  It is nothing of the sort.  The only significant legal development brought about by Flood has been that the Court of Appeal accepted the inevitable – that the Reynolds defence needs to be re-balanced in order to take account of the recognition (arrived at since Reynolds was decided) that a claimant has an Article 8 right to reputation.