Libel bar

Associated Newspapers has proposed that barristers who act for it regularly should not act against it for a number of months after a case. According to The Lawyer of 10 November, some newspaper lawyers have gone so far as to suggest that the libel bar should split along claimant/defendant lines. Condemning the proposal, Desmond Browne QC argued in an interview that the proposals would disable good barristers from acting against newspapers and force them to breach the cab rank principle. He said that there was no need for a set of rules about who can act for and against who. The newspapers could vote with their feet by withdrawing current instructions if someone started acting against them, which they were perfectly entitled to do. He thought that the proposal for the rules was motivated by the system in the US where lawyers act either for claimants or defendants, making legal services in the US inaccessible to claimants. His opposition was really about the principle rather than about the money – we must protect the cab rank principle.