ABSTRACT
As the Defamation Bill 2010-11 2 progressed at a snail’s pace from Lord Lester’s fi rst draft in 2010 to that championed by Minister of State for Justice Lord McNally (and his legal team), it became clear that the Bill was set to be derailed at the last minute. Both peers had made clear that the Defamation Bill was essential to the well-being of British democracy, that people should be free to debate issues and challenge authorities in all spheres of public life, whether political, scientifi c, academic or any other, and that the Bill should revolve around the right to freedom of speech, a cornerstone of the UK constitution. As the Bill made its passage through the House of Lords during the consultation period (2011-12), Lord Lester and Lord McNally ensured that freedom of speech did not mean that people should be able to ride roughshod over the reputations of others, and that the new defamation law ought to strike the right balance – between protection of freedom of speech on the one hand and protection of reputation on the other. 3
It took three years to pass the Defamation Act 2013, following an initial promise by the then Labour Justice Minister, Jack Straw, in early 2010, to reform the libel laws after a series of revelations that libel threats had silenced scientists, doctors, biographers, community lawyers, consumer groups and human rights activists. The cases of Singh 4 and Flood 5 had demonstrated the complexity and diffi culties of modern English libel laws with a multifaceted substantive law and a costly procedure.
