How much telling evidence and simple truth would ever be revealed if it wasn’t for the freedom of the British Press to publish and be damned?
And yet people like me – yep, real McCoy journalists – are being hobbled again by the great British Ass of the Law which has decided once more that the rich, the powerful and the downright disgusting can suppress evidence and gag witnesses.
Yet this right to a private life is only really invoked nowadays by those who have something to hide while the rest of us demand personal privacy yet give our family secrets away to the phish and chip shops waiting on any cyber corner.
Yep, in the past few days. the supreme court has ruled against Bloomberg News in a privacy case that will make it harder for the British media to publish information about individuals subject to criminal investigations.
In 2016 Bloomberg named an American boss at a large public company who was facing a criminal inquiry by a British regulator.
The article was based on a confidential letter Bloomberg had received which revealed that the businessman was being investigated in relation to claims his company had been involved in corruption and bribery in a foreign country.
The businessman – known in the legal proceedings as ZXC – decided to sue Bloomberg over the article, claiming that it had misused his private information as he had not been arrested or charged with any offence in relation to the corruption inquiry.
The case hinged on how to balance the businessman’s right to privacy with Bloomberg’s right to freedom of expression.
It took six years for the court to side with the businessman and trash the media arguments.
In the judgment written by Lord Hamblen and Lord Stephens, they said: “For some time, judges have voiced concerns as to the negative effect on an innocent person’s reputation of the publication that he or she is being investigated by the police or an organ of the state.
“The degree of that harm depends on the factual circumstances, but experience shows that it can be profound and irremediable.”
This supreme court ruling is the latest in a series of judgments which have toughened privacy laws in the UK. The ruling makes it even harder for journalists to publish stories based on confidential documents, even if the leaked material alleges serious wrongdoing.
Hanna Basha, of the law firm Payne Hicks Beach, said the British media would now be severely restricted in “how they are able to report on the early stages of the majority of criminal investigations”.
The businessman in the recent ruling argued that, under the European convention on human rights, he had an expectation that details of the British regulator’s criminal investigation into him would not be made public unless he was charged with an offence.
Bloomberg said the general public understands that reporting the existence of a criminal investigation into an individual does not mean they are necessarily guilty of a criminal offence.
However, the supreme court ruled that even revealing the existence of a criminal inquiry would affect an individual’s “right to establish and develop relationships with other people”.
Bloomberg also argued that the businessman’s work for a major company listed on the stock exchange should not be considered part of his private life and therefore should not be subject to the same legal protections.
The court however said that an article revealing the existence of a criminal inquiry would cause “greater damage to a businessman actively involved in the affairs of a large public company” than to an ordinary member of the public.
And there we have it… a criminal inquiry would cause “greater damage to a businessman actively involved in the affairs of a large public company” than to an ordinary member of the public.
Yet, on the face of it, what could be better than a suspect remaining anonymous until police have found the proof needed to put them in the dock?
Very reasonable — until you look at exactly how much crucial evidence would never be revealed except for the freedom of the Press to publish.
Or how this now allows the rich, powerful and the guilty to use their monetary muscle to suppress evidence, cover their tracks and gag witnesses.
This isn’t a right to privacy, it’s a right to secrecy by keeping the Press at bay.
Until this ruling suspects were investigated by newspapers – under the provisions of media freedom – while police inquiries were going on.
Now we can’t.
Judges have put the right of criminals to privacy above the free Press which lies at the heart of our democracy.
Without one you cannot have the other.
And today we face the fact that privacy is an illusion all over the world except in the ermined minds of those donkeys who stick it in the big asses of our law.
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