News: “‘Protecting free speech: A Public Interest Defence for the Media?”, A Debate at Gray’s Inn – Henry Vane

Journalism in ‘the public interest’ is central to a healthy democracy but extremely hard to define and police.  At present it has an ambiguous legal status; recognised by law but not enshrined in it. The ‘public interest’ is often (successfully) used as a defence by journalists for publishing stories or doing things which are technically illegal. Yet this protection relies on the discretion of judges and the CPS and is not underpinned in statute.

A New Style Public Interest Defence in Libel Law? – Andrew Scott and Alastair Mullis

An interesting proposal has slipped quietly into the mix for consideration during the House of Lords Committee stage deliberations on the Defamation Bill. During the Second Reading debate, Lord Lester mooted a possible alternative to the clause 4 defence of responsible publication on a matter of public interest. The Joint Committee on Human Rights has pressed the Government on the desirability of the new alternative. In our view, the proposal – developed by Sir Brian Neill (pic) – offers an opportunity both to improve the operation of the existing common law defence and to ‘tidy up’ aspects of the existing Bill.

News: Carnegie-Demos report on public interest, strict views on publication, strong support for independent regulation

A new report shows that the public do not trust the ethics of tabloid newspapers and have strict views on “public interest” and illegal information gathering.  It also shows strong public support for an independent regulator to decide issues of public interest.  The report, Voicing the Public Interest: Listening to the public on press regulation was published on Monday 22 October 2012 by the Carnegie UK Trust. 

Are the judges in tune with the public’s view of the public interest?

Last month Inforrm had a case comment on the decision in which the High Court refused a privacy injunction because the former manager of the England football team was “undoubtedly a public figure”.  As such, he belonged to “the category of those from whom the public could reasonably expect a higher standard of conduct”.   This is an approach which has long been promoted by the tabloid press.   But the independent evidence strongly suggests that it is not the public’s own view of the  public interest.

Prosecuting the Media: The DPP’s final guidelines – Alex Bailin QC and Edward Craven

On 13 September 2012 the Director of Public Prosecutions published final Guidelines for prosecutors on assessing the public interest in cases affecting the media. The guidelines set out the approach that the CPS will take to prosecutorial decisions that affect the media. In particular, they provide guidance to prosecutors on how to decide whether a prosecution is in the public interest.

Public interest and the Prince – the Sun fails the responsibility test

So, finally, the “Sun” has come up with a public interest argument to justify writing about and publishing illegally taken photographs of a party in a private hotel room.  Under the headline “We fight for press freedom” the “Sun” bootstraps for Britain – justifying its publication of private photographs by reference to the “debate” which it, and the rest of the media have generated.  The public interest in publishing the photographs is, apparently, “in order for the debate about them to be fully informed“.

Defining the public interest: the public’s view – Steven Barnett

How do you define public interest journalism? One of the great conundrums of the Leveson debate is how you protect the kind of journalism that everyone agrees is the lifeblood of democracy: the fourth estate’s watchdog role. Get it right – ideally, enshrine it in statute – and much else follows. But that depends on what it means.

“Privacy Probity and the public interest” – Reuters Institute Report

The media coverage of the John Terry affair has reminded us of an important report produced by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.  The report is by Stephen Whittle and Glenda Cooper and is entitled “Privacy, Probity and the Public Interest”.

The authors have interviewed lawyers, academics, journalists, bloggers and those who have found their privacy invaded by the media.