"Defamation Bill agreed by Parliament" Hip, Hip Hooray!

Great news! I received this email this evening. Well done to everyone involved in getting rid (mostly) of this nasty, vindictive, unjust, unfair and horrible stain on the whole British judicial process. 

I hope they are celebrating:)

(for details of picture see here)

"Dear Friends

We have some great news to share. The Defamation Bill has been agreed by Parliament and is now just waiting for Royal Assent, which will probably happen today, before becoming an Act of Parliament. This is undoubtedly down to all of your hard work with us over the last few years and you all deserve a huge thank you!

Below are some of the reactions from some of the Libel Reform Campaign supporters. You can read more here: http://www.libelreform.org/news

Tracey Brown, Director, Sense About Science said: “A campaign of small organisations, thousands of individuals and good parliamentarians has achieved changes that were denied to citizens for a century. We can now decide to publish based on ‘is it true’, not ‘will they sue’.”

Kirsty Hughes, Chief Executive, Index on Censorship said: “We now have a Defamation Bill that will strengthen freedom of expression, end the global chill from libel tourism and restrict corporations from suing citizen critics.”

Jo Glanville, Director, English PEN said: “This has been a remarkable campaign that has united politicians and campaigners to reform a law that had become an international embarrassment. The chill has had an impact on anyone speaking out in the public interest - from scientists to bloggers - so this is good news for freedom of speech in the UK.”

Dr Evan Harris, Libel Reform Campaign parliamentary adviser said: “As someone involved the campaign from the start, and from inside and outside Parliament, I can see what an achievement it is to achieve this reform.”

Simon Singh, science writer and defendant in BCA v Singh said: “This is an extraordinary story of cross party collaboration, fired up by a grass roots campaign, backed by everyone from nerds to Mumsnet, which includes mums who are also nerds.”

Justine Roberts, CEO and co-founder of parenting forum Mumsnet said: “It's not perfect, and of course we don't yet have the full detail on how the regulations will deal with publication on the internet. But we applaud the hard work of everyone involved, and are very happy to have been a part of this much-needed reform.”

Charmian Gooch, Director, Global Witness said: “The passage of the Defamation Bill is a long overdue victory in the campaign to reform the UK’s outdated and repressive libel laws.”

You can also read our initial analysis of the Bill (PDF)

We're going to arrange a bit of a gathering to get supporters and champions of the campaign together to celebrate this wonderful accomplishment and let you know what needs to happen next. We all still need to keep the pressure on to make sure the new law is enacted as soon as possible, clear and robust regulations are published, new Civil Procedure Rules are issued and most importantly we need to tell those who try and silence free speech through that libel they can't get away with it any more.

We'll be in touch with more details soon!

Síle & Mike

Information: www.libelreform.org"

Libel reform campaign petition: Don't kill the Bill

I've signed this petition from the Libel reform campaign to my MP asking her to save the current Bill which has nearly passed through Parliament. However it has been hijacked by "unhelpful" amendments in the House of Lords.

While I would personally support these amendments, they are not relevant to libel law and appear likely to scupper the entire Bill.

By coincidence last Saturday was the 2nd anniversary of the throwing out by the Royal Court of Justice of a certain stupid, wasteful and completely pointless Libel case. If the new Bill was passed into law it would help prevent similar nonsense in the future. 

Twitter Joke Appeal: David Allen Green is the Real 007

Great news yesterday that Paul Chambers was cleared by the Lord Chief Justice at the High Court of a criminal conviction for making a daft comment on twitter.

Paul was supported during his appeal(s) by Comedians Stephen Fry and Al Murray.

While his legal team was headed by top solicitor, David Allen Green (also known as blogger "Jack of Kent")

I sent David a twitter message that this is yet another notch for justice in his legal gown!

This is an important victory for free speech and will hopefully make those responsible for protecting us against real terrorist threats think carefully before abusing their powers in such a way. 

I met Paul briefly with David when he was making one of his very many appearances at the Royal Court of Justice (RCJ).

When I was having my own "difficulties" at the RCJ, David helped me out immensely (alongside my Tory comrade, Commissar Robert Dougans). I posted the picture above here (which got this response from you-know-who).

Claimant get £75k Costs Judgement against him in Richard Dawkins, Amazon and Vaughan Jones Libel "strike out".

We have the most stupid, wasteful and self destructive libel laws in the world. Last Friday afternoon in a hearing at the Royal Court of Justice an application to strike out libel action against Richard Dawkins, Amazon and Vaughan Jones (see 2nd left) was agreed and a £75,000 cost judgement

awarded against the claimant Christopher McGarth.

I do actually blame the court process and the law  for this complete and utter waste of time and a huge amount of personal, company and public money.

Litigants in person who have frankly ridiculous legal cases are allowed by the Court to bankrupt not only themselves but also those they perceive to have grievances against almost regardless of the merits of their often weird and wonderful claims.

There is a 39 page written judgement with regard to this latest case which is mostly legal gobbledygook. However I was pleased to see a couple of references in the judgement justifying the strike out to the completely bonkers Kaschke case that I had been most unfortunately a party to. Fellow libel survivors David Osler and Hardeep Singh joined Vaughan outside the Court (see 2nd left with legal advisers including the indomitable Robert Dougans 3rd right).

Afterwards we went for some celebratory sherbets in a local hostelry followed by the traditional basement "libel victory curry" (joined by my best mate ever Mrs Stroppy Olser!).  Media lawyer David Allen Green (aka Jack of Kent) also assisted with the defence. When he posts on case I will link.

Libel Reform and the Queen's Speech

Last week the Libel Reform Campaign sent out a letter calling on its supporters to contact their MP to try and make sure that libel reform is included in the next Queen's speech. Various people who have been subject to the madness that is English Libel law signed the letter including Dave Osler and my good self. Double click screen print to bring up detail.

Please click on this link and send your MP a message.

"We are writing as people who have battled libel threats and actions to ask for your help to make sure reform of the laws gets into next year's Queen's Speech, which sets the legislative agenda for 2012.

People are still being threatened by a law that allows the rich and powerful to bully critics and shut down public debate. Libel reform needs urgent action. The campaign and all its supporters have worked hard to persuade the Ministry of Justice to draw up an effective defamation bill, but if it is not in the Queen's Speech in the spring, then libel reform will be delayed for at least another year, which will be a victory for those who want to silence honest criticism. We can't bear to let this opportunity slip away.

We know we will have to battle against those who want to delay or derail libel reform, and the best way to get our message across is to lobby MPs for support. Please help us by filling in the form to the right to send an email to your MP so they know that all we want for Christmas is the inclusion of libel reform in the Queen's Speech".

Europe tells Kaschke to go forth....

In March this year I posted here that the British Court of Appeal had finally thrown out the libel accusations against Labour Bloggers Alex Hilton, Dave Osler and myself made by Tower Hamlets Labour/Respect/Communist/ Conservative Party member, Johanna Kaschke. 

I have made it clear at the time that I think this has been a ludicrous waste of time, trouble and vast amounts of public money that was allowed to continue for four years despite having "no merit whatsoever". 

Many thanks yet again to top lawyers Robert Dougans, David Allen Green (Jack of Kent) and former members of the CCCP Young Pioneers, for their outstanding help and support. Also last but not least thanks to Stroppy and Montrose.

Recently Ms Kaschke has announced that the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) have  rejected her appeal against the British Court's decision.  I am not sure which of the many appeals to the ECHR she said she would lodge have been rejected.  However, I assume that this matter is now finally finished. Ms Kaschke is of course busy blaming everyone else except herself for this outcome.

I thought to celebrate this occasion I should play this video recording of defendant Dave Osler at the Royal Court of Justice and his magnificent opening argument before Lord Justice Eady.  Luckily Robert and David were later able to rescue his defence.  Or so I am told.

Libel Reform: Sign the Petition and write to your MP

The Libel Reform Campaign is urging people to sign their petition and contact their MP and ask them to support Early Day Motion (EDM) 1636.  The government published a draft defamation Bill in March.

"The Libel Reform Campaign led by English PEN, Index on Censorship and Sense About Science have welcomed the Government’s draft Defamation Bill as ‘a great starting point’ to ensure the first overhaul of our archaic libel laws, but calls upon Parliament to go further in key areas. Since its launch 18 months ago, 55,000 people have signed up to the campaign, with over half of all eligible MPs backing our Early Day Motion in the last session of Parliament. This is the first time any government has promised wholesale reform of our libel laws since 1843.
In particular, the campaign calls for:

• a stronger public interest defence
• an end to the ability of corporations to sue in libel
• more protection for web-hosts and Internet service providers from liability for the words of others".

Super-injunctions, privacy laws and libel have been in the news recently but it is not just the rich and famous who could fall foul of our unfit for purpose libel laws.  I am speaking as someone, who with two blogging comrades (Dave Osler and Alex Hilton), had some little local difficulties (for almost 4 years!) at the Royal Court of Justice.  Grappling over such issues of principle as whether comparing someone to Chocolate Cake is actionable?  and should there be an injunction in case primary school children google the names of their governors and think they are a terrorist?  

Finally, eventually, the cases were thrown out an abuse of process - "not worth the candle" of pursuing. 

However, there is a very serious side to this since these utterly pointless cases probably cost you the taxpayer £100,000's in un-claimable Court costs and check out this account on the real "cost" of the case by Dave's Partner, "Mrs" Stroppy. 

Kaschke v. Gray & Hilton....you thought is was all over?...it is now!

After nearly 4 years of extensive litigation, Lord Justice Thomas today at a hearing in Court 68 of the Royal Courts of Justice refused Johanna Kaschke leave to appeal against her libel case being struck out.

He supported previous rulings that the difference between what Ms Kaschke has admitted to be true and what she thinks is libel, is so insignificant to be an abuse of a full Jury trial.  It is simply not worth the candle.  Even if she was to win (and of course she would not) her damages would only be minimal at very best.

Why this statement of the bleeding obvious has taken such a long time to come about at such a huge cost to the public purse is another matter.

This is now the end of the matter for Alex Hilton and myself.  Ms Kaschke of course intends to take the matter to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).  However, in the extremely unlikely event that the ECHR consider this a case worth examining it will be the British Government who will have to defend it not Alex or I.

Fellow defendant Dave Osler also had the case against him kicked out last year.

Many thanks to Robert Dougans, David Allen Green (Jack of Kent) and former members of the CCCP Young Pioneers for their outstanding help and support. Also last but not least thanks to Stroppy and Montrose. 

The final irony (of many) in this is that Ms Kaschke claims that she got involved in British Politics because she was worried as a Council tenant about her security of tenure. She then made her long march from Labour to Respect to CPGB to CPB to Labour (again briefly) then to the Conservative Party.  Her beloved David Cameron and his Tory-led government is now responsible for introducing changes to the Housing benefit system which will mean that Council tenants such as herself who under occupy their homes (have more bedrooms than they are deemed to need) will face being evicted.

Picture from last July when case first dismissed.

UPDATE: Check Index against Censorship press release and David Allen Green's post in the New Statesman about the case "with no merit whatsoever".

UPDATE: ECHR decision

Kaschke Blogging Libel Update

The legal saga and complete waste of Court time and public funds continues. Please bear with me while I try to set the scene and explain - since it is just a tinny weeny bit confusing.

In 2007 Tower Hamlet's own SPD turned Labour Party turned Respect turned CPGB turned CPB turned Labour and finally Conservative Party blogger, Johanna Kaschke, sued for libel Labour bloggers Dave Osler (Dave's Part), Alex Hilton (Labourhome) and myself.  In September 2010 Kaschke's ludicrous case against Dave had been finally and completely thrown out of court for abuse of process.  She is still as you can see threatening him with some sort of legal action.

In July 2010 her case against Alex and I was struck out also for abuse of process (pending appeals). Last week, Kaschke lost a written appeal against the decision to strike out her claim (see copy of order left) despite her "lengthy arguments". However she is still allowed to have a oral hearing requesting an appeal.  This will now take place at the Royal Court of Justice on 2 March 2011. 

Alex and I are being ably assisted by Assistant Solicitor of the Year" (2010) and The Times "Lawyer of the week" Robert Dougans and top legal blogger, David Allen Green, (aka Jack of Kent).

I am of course pleased that Ms Kaschke, who obviously as a personal libel litigant is concerned about reputational damage has decided to withdraw her incisive, intellectual masterpiece post "John Gray is a Fat Ponze".

:)

UPDATE: but I have been reminded that she still posts here "Incumbent Labour Councillor Worships Machinegun wielding hero".

Let them eat Schwarzwälderkirschtorte

This is a great fun steal from Socialist Unity. The German trade union IG Metal is responsible for this site where you click on a cake and throw it at leading German Politicos. 

You even get points for each successful hit (see left).

Click here and enjoy!

For some strange, strange reason I feel that I must send this link to Dave and Alex (and Stroppy, David, Robert and Monty...).

Kaschke loses Libel Appeal against Dave Osler

Another Tower Hamlets saga.  Self proclaimed “Party Shopper” Johanna Kaschke failed to get permission at the Royal Court of Justice (RCJ) today to appeal against her libel case being thrown out as an abuse of process.

Kaschke was trying to sue Dave for libel over a web post he did about her on his blog.  It was a completely ludicrous claim that should never have got before any court in the first place and should never have taken over 3 years to be dismissed.

One of her libel claims against Dave was that a commentator on his blog had described her as being "one cherry short of a Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte".

Kaschke has exhausted the British judicial process but will no doubt continue to try and waste public funds on other pointless legal adventures.

I’ve just had a cheery conversation with Dave on the phone.  Much to my regret I was unable to be there in person.  He is in a pub (naturally) celebrating and about to go off to our favourite RCJ Indian restaurant for a meal.  Before going off to the AWL 70^th anniversary “celebration” of Trotsky’s assassination! (or something like that?) A busy day.  My AWL invite must have been lost in the post.

Dave (Photo: on the left of course) thanks his top Solicitor-Advocate, Robert Dougans, (bottom of photo) and blogging solicitor David Allen Green (top - aka Jack of Kent).  No doubt Dave and David will post on today’s events in due course. 

Alex Hilton and I await the pleasure of Ms Kaschke company at the RCJ in a month or so as she seeks permission to appeal the judgment that her claim against us should also be thrown out. 

I can’t wait.

(pictures from Dave's partner Stroppy Bird who was herself libelled by Kaschke who keeps referring to her as Mrs Osler!!!!)

Finally - A Victory - for Common Sense.

We won. It's struck out.  What a complete and utter waste of time, energy and (public) money. Many thanks to Robert, David (and Matthew)

nuf said

Kaschke Appeal in Osler case denied!

Just heard that the Court of Appeal has refused Kaschke's written request for permission to appeal about her case against Dave Olser being struck out as an abuse of process. 

I've just had this comment on Facebook from someone following this mess "Yippee! I await another interminable conspiracy blaming post...". 

No doubt she will now demand a full oral hearing before the Court of Appeal(as is her right - but of course a further complete and utter waste of Court time and public funds).

We may find out the result of another case tomorrow!

"Incumbent Labour Councillor worships machinegun wielding hero"

Well, what can you say? except once upon a time, a long, long time ago - far, far away from reality there was a planet called Kaschke and ...

(Apparently it was not a machine gun but a "Heckler and Koch 9mm mp5 with silencer. It's an SMG".

Jack of Kent on "Kaschke v. you know who" case

Top legal blogger (and all round nice guy) Jack of Kent reports on the latest round of legal nonsense and complete waste of public funds here.

As usual he cuts to the quick to make complicated legal matters clear to (nearly) everyone.

"Assistant Solicitor of the Year" at this year's Lawyer Awards (June 2010) and The Times "Lawyer of the week" Robert Dougans is also doing his very best to sort out this utter mess.

See what happens tomorrow I suppose. 

This is purely coincidental and nothing to do whatsoever of course with the present case - but can anyone advise me what would happen to a claimant, who let us say, happened to blatantly lie repeatedly about a significant issue to a High Court Judge in a pre trail hearing?

I assume something pretty 'orrible?

Hat tip thingy for the above Jack of Kent caption to Science, Reason and Critical thinking

UPDATE:

The classic Battle of Cressy Poem:

"...Ha! cried the Prince, is it thou my gallant Jack of Kent,

Now charge with me my brave lad for thou has been sent

By God, to aid me in the midst of the fight,

So forward, and wield your cudgel with all your might...."

Total Politics Blog Poll 2010

I’ve just emailed my current top ten blogs to the “Total Politics” annual blog “Beauty Parade”. Total Politics impartiality is obviously somewhat dubious since it is owned and run by Tories (with a supposedly “neutral” board overseeing) but it is the political website of choice for many serious politicians.

Thankfully - you are not allowed to post on who you have selected since I am sure that it I will leave some blogging folk I have left out - just a little bit miffed at me for doing so.

Needless to say one cherry short of a Schwarzwalderkirschtorte was not one of the 10:)

You have until 31 July to take part.

BTW - This is the list I compiled in 2008 (but never got round to sending). It has changed since.

(picture of the demonstrators outside the Miss World competition in London 1970. Some of them later broke into the event and threw floor bombs at host, Bob Hope and the contestants . I use to work with one of the protesters in the 1980's, Jake Prescott, who in 1970 dressed up for the first time in his life in a dinner suit in order to get into the venue. Jake then later went off to make other type of bombs).

Jack of Kent on the “Osler Decison”

Top legal blogger Jack of Kent looks here at the decision in detail. He calls it “a refreshingly liberal judgment, though one which is in the context of an ongoing overall failure of English libel law”.

He thinks that it is a useful judgement for bloggers and other internet publishers with regard to the need for claimants to have to prove "publication". Which sounds like it should be the bleeding obvious but not in the weird and wonderful world of libel land.

He concludes with:-

“Now that the case has been struck out, it is difficult to believe it continued for two years and was about to be put to a full jury trial.

However, the complications and technical nature of libel law means that once claims are launched they are excruciatingly expensive in terms of time and money to close down, even when - as in this case - the claim was not clearly not actionable in the first place.

In the upcoming debate over libel reform, it will not be enough to look only at discrete and particular proposals for reform.

There needs to be a fundamental consideration of the role of private right to a reputation in a modern society that requires free discourse on public matters.

Here it is significant that the Osler Blogpost was a non-actionable publication relevant to the political activities of a Claimant, and it was a publication based on publications freely made by the Claimant.

For this to lead to two years of litigation, resolvable only by the pro bono intervention of specialised lawyers, cannot be characterised in any other way than as a fail.

It is by examples such as these that we can see how libel disfigures our polity and our public debates”.

(picture is of Welsh freedom fighter Owain Glyndŵr who some believe to be the figure behind the traditional folk hero “Jack of Kent”)

Dave Osler wins Libel case against former “terrorist suspect” Johanna Kaschke

Congratulations to my fellow Labour Party blogger Dave and his legal team for yesterday's judgement by Justice Eady at the Royal Court of Justice. Kaschke is also trying to have a go at Alex Hilton and me for similar nonsense. I was unable to be there this morning since I was representing a trade union member. 

Justice Eady clearly believes (in my view) that the claimant Johanna Kaschke is a some sort of frivolous applicant and threw out her claims against Dave due to “abuse of process” (amongst other things). In lay terms I understand his judgement (see here) to mean that her substantive complaint was so minor and petty that even in the extremely unlikely situation that she was to “win” the case (after a probable 1-2 week jury trail) she would have received such very nominal damages that it would “not be worth the candle” to have heard the case. 

It is practically unheard of for libel cases to be knocked back for this reason which shows how completely daft it was in the first place.  In a nutshell Kaschke is a German born national who in her youth in the 1970's had been wrongly arrested and detained on warrant for several weeks by the German police on suspicion of being involved in terrorist activities.  She was released without charge and later given compensation for wrongful detention. Despite posting this information on her own blog and being offered a full right of reply she decided to sue Dave for posting about her own admissions.

Check out the links here, here, here about the whole sorry silly tale of how a former Labour Party member who failed to be a Parliamentary candidate defected to Respect then turned to the Communist Part of Great Britain then the Communist Party of Britain then the Labour Party again and finally (for now) joined the Conservative Party - all within a few months. Who then went on to waste tens of thousands of pounds of public money by taking out multiple libel actions and court applications that were doomed to fail. There has probably by now been millions of pages of documents wasted and thousands of hours of court administration officers and officials time used up. An incredible number of different expensive direction hearings, applications and appeals. Imagine how much Royal Court of Justice Masters and Judges are paid per day and how much nonsense they had to read and listen to!

Dave is a professional journalist and has suffered the stress and uncertainty of if he was to lose this action being made bankrupt and losing his home for the past 3 years.  Check out his Partner Stroppy account of the stress and strains this has caused.

I don’t totally blame Kaschke (well maybe only 99%) since the system should have never allowed this to happen in the first place. A clearly obsessive individual with a grudge should not be allowed to use the Courts as their play thing. She has been allowed to not only waste everyone’s time and money (especially the taxpayer) but to also ruin and damage herself, when it should have been obvious to the Courts that something was clearly wrong in planet Kaschke a long, long time ago.

As a housing officer I have been to civil courts for a number of years and found that although judges tend to be very supportive of unrepresented litigants they will stand for none of the daftness that has gone on here and it can be very much "rough justice" at times.  Libel law seems to be taken far more seriously by the Court system than tenants losing their homes?  I can guess the reason why.

We need libel reform urgently.

Kaschke of course is now blaming everyone else except herself for the position she is in and is resorting to bare faced porkies. She has threatened to sue the legal blogger Jack of Kent (not a wise move since he is a top lawyer) who is now going to court to get her classed as a vexatious applicant.  She is even trying to use the good name of a sick children’s hospital charity to support her case.  Tut, tut.

As Dave said “the Tories are welcome to her”.

Dave Osler and his “Schwarzwälderkirschtorte” update

Check out Dave Osler’s account here of Friday’s “performance” (in the true sense of the word) before Justice Eady at Court 13 in the Royal Court of Justice...and also an alternative view.

What a ridiculous and absurd waste of time, money and scarce judicial resources.

What a joke. Further evidence if needed that our libel laws are in a complete and utter mess!

Ladybird "Chiropractic Treatment & English Libel Law"

Check out this superb spoof by Crispian Jago of "Science, Reason and Critical Thinking" blog of the attempt by the British Chiropractic Association (BCA) to bully the critic of some of their wilder and unsubstantiated claims, Simon Singh, into silence by abusing our crazy libel laws.

Personally I would have thought that the book could have been called "Chiropractic Treatment for Dummies" since it is now clear that this is the BCA target audience?

I have had friends with back problems who swear by their Chiropractic. But the wild claims by some "practitioners" that they can cure practically anythings discredits all of them. The behaviour of the British Chiropractic Association is particularly disgraceful.

Check out this post that Britain is being turned into a global laughing stock because of our draconian libel laws.

I will declare an interest.