I join hon. Members in thanking the outgoing ministerial team and the former Secretary of State for Justice for their collaboration and work; I congratulate them on that. I also congratulate the new team on their appointment, particularly the new Secretary of State, whom we very much welcome to his responsibilities. As the shadow Secretary of State said, the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats and the Labour party went into the last election with a commitment to reform defamation and libel law. That commitment was satisfactorily reaffirmed in the coalition agreement. There is consensus that the one thing we must deliver this Session is reformed libel law along the lines of the Bill. We have made good progress, but there is general agreement that we are not completely there yet.
I share exactly the view expressed by the new Secretary of State on why we need the Bill. We need to uphold the rights of freedom of expression, in particular for journalism, and to encourage good journalism, including good investigative journalism, in the process. Journalists should not be afraid of exposing what they need to expose in the public interest. We also need to ensure that ordinary people are protected against poor and misrepresenting journalists, who ruin reputations in such a way that they cannot be recovered. That is the balance we need to strike.
After the election, my noble Friend Lord Lester of Herne Hill was pivotal in putting the matter on the agenda. Both Houses have worked hard through the Joint Committee to make progress, and the Government picked up many, but not all, of its suggestions. My party has twice in the last year looked at the matter at our conferences: to ensure that we have methods for resolving disputes—built into the legislation, if possible—so that if, for example, untrue defamatory statements are propagated, they can be withdrawn without everything having to go through the courts; and to ensure that we enhance our freedom in this country, not reduce it.
There are three matters left to look at, as part of the ongoing debate. One is whether the current processes in the law on early strike-out are sufficient. I heard what the Minister said, but that remains an issue. We want to be able to get rid of nonsense cases—our hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) made the case powerfully—to stop them clogging up the courts. We need to see whether we have adequate processes to do that. Secondly, we need to ensure that the public interest defence works appropriately. That is probably the most difficult and controversial area to get right. I am grateful that Ministers have said that they are willing to look broadly at the issues again. Lastly, there is the controversial question of whether the law should protect only individuals or also corporations, and, if so, how. I have no doubt that we shall return to that issue.
We now have some time after Third Reading before the Bill goes to the Lords. We will engage with people in the other place. We need to pause to ensure that when
Lord Justice Leveson reports we do not confuse things in taking the Bill to the statute book, while at the same time picking up all the proposals he makes. Many people have helped us in the campaign to get libel law reformed, not least the Libel Reform Campaign. We thank them and look forward to continuing to work with them. The work is not completed, but a lot of good work has been done and there is general good will about ensuring that, for the first time in a generation, we bring the libel laws up to date for a modern Britain, in a modern world of communication, but where freedom of speech remains something of which we can be justifiably proud.
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