Panorama journalist John Ware has won his libel case against Press Gang editor Paddy French and been awarded total damages of £90,000.
High Court judge Mr Justice Knowles also issued a permanent injunction stopping French from repeating the allegations at the centre of the claim after recent statements he made showed a “disregard” for Ware’s reputation.
Ware sued for libel after French published an online article and pamphlet about a July 2019 BBC Panorama programme in which he looked into anti-Semitism in the Labour party.
French described the programme as a “rogue piece of journalism” and distributed the claims to more than 100 senior figures at the BBC, Channel 4 News, Sky News, LBC, the Guardian, the Times, the Sunday Times and the Sun on Sunday.
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Ware has been a journalist since 1971 and worked for the BBC for many years until 2012 when he became freelance. He told the court that the allegation “he had deliberately disseminated false information, and so been unscrupulous and dishonest, for the pre-eminent purpose of advantaging the electoral chances of a political party (by harming another) is the antithesis of everything he has stood for in his 50-odd years as a journalist,” according to the judgment.
Ware was not given a right of reply before publication, though French insisted he gave the BBC press office several opportunities to respond.
‘Accusation of the utmost seriousness’ against a journalist
Ware said he had decided to take legal action “whatever the risk” after seeing a demonstration outside New Broadcasting House in London in December 2019 that had been organised by French in connection with the article and pamphlet, which also contained wider allegations about the BBC. Ware said he expects to take some criticism as a journalist but what French published was “not acceptable”.
Ware said he was “proud” of the work he and his colleagues had done on the Panorama programme and that it was “carefully and fully researched” during months of preparation.
He was also particularly upset by French “deliberately targeting those on whom he is dependent for his livelihood as a freelance journalist” by distributing it to senior managers and said he believed some commissioning editors may have believed he could not be trusted and decided not to send him work.
This supposition was accepted by the judge who pointed out that French was only able to crowdfund from more than 1,000 people to fight the case “because they believed his accusations that [Ware] was a dishonest and rogue journalist whose intention had been to harm the Labour Party”.
Mr Justice Knowles said the article “did cause, or was likely to cause” Ware serious harm, adding: “To accuse a lifelong professional journalist of being a ‘rogue’ journalist, who had acted dishonestly in order to further a political agenda, was an accusation of the utmost seriousness… if a journalist loses his or her reputation for truthfulness, honesty and integrity, then their journalistic currency is effectively worthless.”
French had originally planned to use the truth and public interest defences, but dropped the first this summer before withdrawing from participating in the case altogether shortly before the trial date.
He claimed he could not test the evidence he had wanted to bring about the programme, most pertinently that it was “one-sided”, because of another High Court judge’s decision on the meaning of the words he had written.
Mr Justice Saini ruled in 2021 that French’s words were “clearly defamatory” as they meant that Ware was a “rogue journalist who had engaged in dirty tricks aimed at harming the Labour Party’s chances of winning the general election by authoring and presenting an edition of Panorama in which he presented a biased and knowingly false presentation of the extent and nature of anti-Semitism within the party, deliberately ignoring contrary evidence”.
However Mr Justice Knowles has said French’s claim he was dropping the truth defence because of this ruling was “cynical and untrue”. The defendant was in September ordered to pay £15,00 in costs to Ware for the work done prepping for the truth defence, but this has not yet been paid.
The judge added that French’s announcement in October that he was withdrawing altogether “very seriously exacerbated the damage caused to the claimant, by seeking to ensure that any judgment in his favour would be seen by his publishees as arising from some sort of unwarranted or unfair judicial intervention, as opposed to the reality, namely, that the defendant had no defence”.
A one-hour hearing still took place in French’s absence earlier in November, with Ware taking the witness stand to say he had been “pretty bewildered” by French’s decision as the defendant had insisted from the start that he would vigorously defend the case.
Ware said: “I wanted my day in court. But not just this unsatisfactory one-sided affair… I wanted my day in court but Mr French has slithered away.”
Damages decision
Ware initially wanted £50,000 in damages but said he should get more following French’s withdrawal.
Mr Justice Knowles said the size of the £90,000 damages reflected the seriousness of French’s defamatory allegations in regard to the potential impact on Ware’s work as a journalist, the widespread dissemination of the claims, the “intentional targeting” of senior journalism bosses that Ware relies on for work as well as “deliberate picketing” at the BBC, and Ware’s “palpable anger and distress”.
He added that French had aggravated the situation by maintaining his use of the truth defence for more than a year before dropping it, his “cynical and untrue portrayal” and by continuing to maintain in public statements that his allegations were true. The judge said French’s attitude towards proceedings, at least since he dropped the truth defence, “has been one of contempt”.
French has raised about £94,000 including from two crowdfunders since Ware launched the case, but most of this was quickly swallowed by legal fees, he has said.
In a statement following the judgment, French claimed the case “raises serious questions about press freedom in Britain” as it “sets a dangerous precedent – Britain’s state broadcaster is permitting its reporters to engage in litigation against the corporation’s critics”.
He vowed to continue investigating the Panorama broadcast and said he would put out a full report next year.
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