Adverse reflection on claimant

Miller v Associated Newspapers Ltd [2010] EWHC 700 (QB); LSG 22 April p14

The defendant applied to strike out the claimant’s claim for defamation. The defendant published an article claiming that the Metropolitan Police Commissioner had used public money to employ the claimant, who was an old friend, through his company, to help him to improve his public image. The claimant alleged the article had two defamatory meanings: first that he had corruptly exploited his friendship with the Commissioner to obtain a large and improper payment from public funds; second that he had agreed on behalf of his company to act as the Commissioner’s image consultant under a ‘vanity contract’, knowing that his company lacked the relevant knowledge or experience, thus improperly obtaining payment for work that his company was not competent to do. The court upheld the defendant’s contention that those meanings were unsustainable and would be struck out. However, the action as a whole was not struck out because it would not be perverse for a reasonable reader, having read the article, to come to the conclusion that it reflected adversely on the claimant’s character or integrity. Sometimes such allegations could be to a person’s discredit even though he had kept within the letter of the law. That consideration underlined why it was appropriate to leave the matter for a jury to assess rather than for a judge to rule the matter out at a preliminary stage.