High Court lifts Sir Fred Goodwin anonymity injunction

[Halb]

Fred the Shred has lost his anonymity.
Hmm, another super injunction with another superrich type protecting his privacy, should this have occured or not?

article said:

"Lord Stoneham told peers: "Every taxpayer has a direct public interest in the events leading up to the collapse of the Royal Bank of Scotland, so how can it be right for a super-injunction to hide the alleged relationship between Sir Fred Goodwin and a senior colleague.

"If true, it would be a serious breach of corporate governance and not even the Financial Services Authority would be allowed to know about it."
A review of the use of super-injunctions was ordered last April. It has been carried out by a committee of senior judges, newspaper group representatives and libel lawyers, and chaired by Master of the Rolls Lord Neuberger - the most senior civil law judge at the Court of Appeal.

Lord McNally said the government "recognises the importance of finding the right balance between individual rights to privacy on the one hand, and freedom of expression and transparency of official information on other other".

Should superinjunctions and hyperinjunctions be allowed?
If you want any further answers adding just say
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-ord...

[Ozzie Osmond]

If a story is true then it should not be suppressed by injunction.

However, there needs IMO to be a proper requirement for "fair" reporting with significant penalties if a newspaper over-steps the mark.

[Murph7355]

Ozzie Osmond said:

...if a newspaper over-steps the mark.

Question is, where is the mark?

tbh, most of the ste that gets reported in newspapers is irrelevant gossip.

[Victor McDade]

It's essentially a two tier system - if you're rich enough, well then you can afford to buy your privacy but if you don't have the a spare 50-100k then tough luck.

I think the tabloid media needs reigned in over here but not sure this is the way to do it.

[JohnnyRims]

Victor McDade said:

It's essentially a two tier system - if you're rich enough, well then you can afford to buy your privacy but if you don't have the a spare 50-100k then tough luck.

I think the tabloid media needs reigned in over here but not sure this is the way to do it.

Agree with both of those points. Earlier in the week the whole world found out that Milly Dowler's father has some unusual sexual likes, a fact which only came to light because his daughter was murdered. Meanwhile 'celebrities' shag about a bit and then drop £100k to make sure no one can find out about it.

Of course, the ideal situation would be no restrictions on what could be reported, but with the press exercising some discretion as to what they report. However if it's a choice between super-injunctions or free press with gossip and tittle tattle then I'd much rather have to read about where premiership footballers have been sticking their cocks than feel like people in power got to keep things from me.

[johnnyreggae]

Presumably now the injunction has been varied he can tell his wife about it............

[Derek Smith]

Many feel the balance was too far towards secrecy before the flood of superinjunctions.

The current interpretation of HR is wrong, that much is clear. Trafigura was allowed to stop publication of what was said in parliament:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/oct/20/trafig...

That would be bad enough but what they did was:

http://www.ministryoftruth.me.uk/2009/10/13/trafig...

The dicision to allow this shows the state of the judicial system in this country. Not all, or perhaps even most, would have allowed this but one wonders what was going through the judge's mind when he limited our rights to know what was said in open parliament.

Carter-Ruck. I wonder if those lawyers working for the company ever think back to what they went into lawyering for.

[DJRC]

I have relatively little problems with the various types of injunctions to be honest. If A,B or C list celebs want to drop 100k to prevent the release of information of who they have been shagging then go ahead. Its your waste of money and the British taxpayer thanks you.

Each request however gets a "public interest" review from the Court of Appeal and those with genuine public interest are denied their request. Public Interest in this case defined by the Law Lords, it is after all their job. The Welsh footballer for example had fk all public interest and he was welcome to his injunction, whilst Fred the Shred should be the subject of as much public interest as possible and it should have been denied in about 2 seconds flat.


And of course the law operates on a cash basis, it always has done.

[Halb]

DJRC said:

I have relatively little problems with the various types of injunctions to be honest. If A,B or C list celebs want to drop 100k to prevent the release of information of who they have been shagging then go ahead. Its your waste of money and the British taxpayer thanks you.

What aboot the other party? Who wish to tell the world who thay shagged?

[Du1point8]

DJRC said:

I have relatively little problems with the various types of injunctions to be honest. If A,B or C list celebs want to drop 100k to prevent the release of information of who they have been shagging then go ahead. Its your waste of money and the British taxpayer thanks you.

Each request however gets a "public interest" review from the Court of Appeal and those with genuine public interest are denied their request. Public Interest in this case defined by the Law Lords, it is after all their job. The Welsh footballer for example had fk all public interest and he was welcome to his injunction, whilst Fred the Shred should be the subject of as much public interest as possible and it should have been denied in about 2 seconds flat.


And of course the law operates on a cash basis, it always has done.

So noone wanted to know that a famous welsh footballer with a clean cut image and high and mighty morales did no wrong oh wait he shagged a BB contestant, but everyone needs to know about a person who stepped out of the spotlight a few years ago after he headed up the bad decision to acquire ABN AMRO and because his name is on the contract he lost out.

Its like reporting Bob Diamond has been shagging his PA... its not really a media worthy story, the only thing in it is that they are hell bent on destroying Fred's life in its entirity, nothing more!!

You know what, why if the MPs can do this kind of stuff and MPs declare 'victory' for freedom of speech... why is it one rule for them and one rule for everyone else? MPs are the most hypocritical people on this earth, if they declare this a victory, I think they should allow public investigation of any MP , including their financials when ever we want without them hiding behind closed doors of parliment.

[James P]

Derek Smith said:

Carter-Ruck. I wonder if those lawyers working for the company ever think back to what they went into lawyering for.

For the lawyers that choose to work there, the money?

[Eric Mc]

The battle for secrecy is over. We live in a new world where it's getting harder and harder to keep a lid on things. People will just have to learn to live with it.

If they don't want their indiscretions found out - maybe they should consider whether they should embark on such indiscretions in the first place.

Read "The Light of Other Says" by Stephen Baxter and Arthur C Clarke. They predicted a world where the notion of secrecy was completely eroded by technology and it resulted in a massive change of society's approach to keeping things under cover.

[Derek Smith]

James P said:

Derek Smith said:

Carter-Ruck. I wonder if those lawyers working for the company ever think back to what they went into lawyering for.

For the lawyers that choose to work there, the money?

Do you know, I think you might have something there. I always thought it was to help people, the wronged and the under-privledged. Could I be wrong? It would require a massive leap of faith to accept that the main, nawy the only, motivation was to line their pockets.

[Du1point8]

Derek Smith said:

James P said:

Derek Smith said:

Carter-Ruck. I wonder if those lawyers working for the company ever think back to what they went into lawyering for.

For the lawyers that choose to work there, the money?

Do you know, I think you might have something there. I always thought it was to help people, the wronged and the under-privledged. Could I be wrong? It would require a massive leap of faith to accept that the main, nawy the only, motivation was to line their pockets.

Well I dare say that some get in just to defend murderers or rapists... I would hazard a guess that they do it for a) the love of the work (not the individual cases) and b) for the hope they can get the decent money... but its mostly b).

[Cupramax]

Eric Mc said:

If they don't want their indiscretions found out - maybe they should consider whether they should embark on such indiscretions in the first place.

And what about people who are the victims of false accusations? Should they have their good name ruined by the media over an arrest which turns out to be caused maliciously?

[Du1point8]

Cupramax said:

Eric Mc said:

If they don't want their indiscretions found out - maybe they should consider whether they should embark on such indiscretions in the first place.

And what about people who are the victims of false accusations? Should they have their good name ruined by the media over an arrest which turns out to be caused maliciously?

Like the Barry George incident?

[grumbledoak]

They should only allow injunctions. But, as the action of a court, it should be reportable that an injunction was made. You won't get much justice behind closed doors.

[Cupramax]

Du1point8 said:

Like the Barry George incident?

Hardly, that was an exceptional case. He was found guilty in a court, which consequently was proven unsafe.

I'm thinking more of the arrest of Joanna Yates Grey haired neighbour... The media should be stopped from the mass histeria that was going on there.

[elster]

Derek Smith said:

James P said:

Derek Smith said:

Carter-Ruck. I wonder if those lawyers working for the company ever think back to what they went into lawyering for.

For the lawyers that choose to work there, the money?

Do you know, I think you might have something there. I always thought it was to help people, the wronged and the under-privledged. Could I be wrong? It would require a massive leap of faith to accept that the main, nawy the only, motivation was to line their pockets.

Hardly surprising though.

[Eric Mc]

Cupramax said:

Eric Mc said:

If they don't want their indiscretions found out - maybe they should consider whether they should embark on such indiscretions in the first place.

And what about people who are the victims of false accusations? Should they have their good name ruined by the media over an arrest which turns out to be caused maliciously?

Of course that's a problem - but legal redress should be possible for those who feel they need to defend their name - as it is.

The world isn't perfect.

But I really think trying to block stories by court orders in the modern age is not dissimilar to King Canute trying to hold back the sea.

It's a new world and we will just have to get used to it.