THE SUBMITTED AMENDMENT READS AS FOLLOWS:

At line 53, insert the following:
17. The protection of freedom of expression, by reforming the libel
laws in England and Wales to ensure that a better balance is provided
between free speech, responsible journalism, scientific discourse and
the public interest on the one hand and powerful corporations, wealthy
individuals and vested interests on the other.
[Applicability needs amending]“

Truth is also an absolute (and the best!) defence.

The problem with the solution advocated above is how do you decide whether these things are the case without some sort of judicial procedure. If your talking about a system where someone’s reputation can be impugned in a way which leaves them with no possible* remedy then that’s not an idea I could support.

*That is a remedy in theory, there is an issue with defamation, as with other actions, about access to the courts. Having been libelled in fairly crude terms by another blogger I decided not to bother with legal action as it wasn’t worth the time and energy. One Lib Dem I know who successfully defended a libel action has not, AFAIK recovered their costs several years later.

Exactly. Hywel, if accuations of negligence are deemed defamatory, how would medical negligence be reported? how would banker fraud be brought to light? how could we criticise the government for leading us into the Iraq war? Particularly when the accusation of negligence (if that is what Singh’s article is being seen as) are based on evidence that a practice is baseless and has no roots in fact, then these accusations must be allowed to be expressed to promote healthy debate.

We are in an awful situation if it is illegal to say that someone has ignored relevant evidence. How can historical or scientific debate go on in these circumstances? In fact, how could public policy be criticised?

All I’ve read is an extract on Wikipedia which I assume is the section under dispute (it’s obviously difficult to reprint an article that is the subject of a libel action).

“When I read it I understood him to be accusing them of negligence (ignoring the evidence) and delusion (believing that their fanciful treatments actually help people).”

Accusations of negligence are just as defamatory as ones of fraud!

Not unless he didn’t actually say what he is being accused of. Have you read the article? If you read it and the two sentences that the BCA object to you can decide for yourself whether you understand him to be accusing them of fraud as opposed to negligence. When I read it I understood him to be accusing them of negligence (ignoring the evidence) and delusion (believing that their fanciful treatments actually help people).

“I really meant to say….” isn’t a defence to defamation. Well certainly not a very good one though it might have some bearing on what the jury conclude the defamatory statement actually meant.

“surely the public have a right to be protected against snake-oil salesmen – if so, how can we stop people from accusing snake-oil salesmen of being snake-oil salesmen?”

The qualified privilege defence would cover such a situation – and I’m sure that it will be argued when this comes to trial.

This is the whole point. In saying that the treatments being promoted were ‘bogus,’ Simon was not saying that the chiropracters were lying, just that there is no evidence that the treatments being promoted are effective as per the claims made by practitioners. No accusations of lying were ever made, and yet Justice Eady’s pre-trial ruling assumes the opposite in a sense.

@ Hywel: The conduct of the BCA is being criticised on scientific grounds, with a body of reliable evidence to back it up. If commentary this robust is deemed libellous, where does that leave us? It is the ease with which special interest groups (lobbies, whatever you like to call them) can sue for libel instead of engaging in debate over the real issues (i.e whether chiropractic, specifically administered to treat infant colic or asthma, is effective) that is of concern.

@ Millian: “Simon Singh should not have accused those silly people of deliberately misleading their customers. Then he would not face libel charges.” This is the very sort of self-censorship we’re trying to avoid – if everyone goes around scared of being sued for writing anything remotely controversial how could we hold anyone to account publicly?

His statement about the BCA is not evidence-based commentary, it is a claim about the conduct of a professional regulatory body. Had he written, “Claims that chiropractic treatments can treat colic are clearly bogus” that defames no-one (well probably…). I don’t see how this case prevents scientific criticism as it is, in part at least, about a claim of the conduct of the BCA.

“You buy a newspaper with a pound coin. you hand over the coin in good faith that it’s legal tender, but if it turns out to be a fake it would still be legitimate to call the coin ‘bogus’ whilst not implying malice on your part.”

Different situation, I’m not implying that anyone has been engaged in dishonest/unprofessional conduct. If however I accused the shopkeeper of knowing passing fake coins then that would be prima facie defamatory. Several defences could arise (truth of the statement, possibly that it was made without malice and in the public interest).

If Simon Singh’s statement is true (ie proved on balance of probabilities) then that would be pretty much an absolute defence. But it must be true as regards the whole of the statement.

“I hope he wins on appeal.”

AIUI (which is on limited reading so I may be wrong) the situation is that Justice Eady has made a ruling on the meaning of the statement and in effect set the question that the jury must answer.

Don’t get me wrong; I have a great deal of sympathy for the anti-woo brigade, but I don’t think that this case really hinges on “suing against science” – it is more of a case of “suing against ambiguous wording”. It is unfortunate indeed that Singh got Justice Eady for the case, who, it seems (and I hope it isn’t libellous to say!) to stick quite strongly on the side of libel-suit-bringers. I suspect that many other judges would have taken Singh’s article as ‘comment’ and not considered that ‘hokum’, or whatever the word used was, implied dishonesty.

But then, one might say that ignoring evidence about the potentially fatally-damaging aspects of one’s profession (chiropractic has been known to kill, as Singh’s original article rightly claims), never mind ignoring more than a century of scientific advancement of the understanding of the human body, in order to keep practicing was a kind of dishonesty.

I hope he wins on appeal.

Not too sure how the amendment is vague, as this issue arose in this instance from a science writer being silenced when writing evidence-based commentary. Again I emphasise that the final wording of any legislation to spring from this would be passed over by experts in the field (of which I am not one). The accusation that the wording of party policy is not tight enough can be levelled at many aspects of many motions at conference, the point is that this wording was agreed after much deliberation and is still open to adjustment at the point at which we draft any legislation based on it.

As for you point about BCA’s conduct – imagine this. You buy a newspaper with a pound coin. you hand over the coin in good faith that it’s legal tender, but if it turns out to be a fake it would still be legitimate to call the coin ‘bogus’ whilst not implying malice on your part. If Simon is made to defend the use of the word bogus at trial, and he loses, there is a risk that almost all critical commentary will be stripped of adjectives such as bogus, fake, empty, etc.

Agree with the point about legal chill and no win no fee, the amendment calls for ‘a review of Britain’s libel law,’ which would certainly include this issue – as for the rest, I’m looking for the “let’s agree to disagree” emoticon