Davies J held that the defendant GP had not failed in his duty of care by failing to diagnose symptoms of meningitis following an examination of his patient who was subsequently diagnosed with such disease after her admission to hospital the next day. There had been an evidential dispute between the GP and the patient’s parents as to the symptoms with which the patient presented on the day of the examination. Davies J preferred the evidence of the GP that no such symptoms were present on the day ...
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A defamation action brought against a solicitor in respect of comments made by him to the Daily Mail in response to an article made against his client was protected by the defence of qualified privilege as it was made within the scope of his retainer to act in his client’s interest.
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The Court of Appeal held that the judge had erred in rejecting expert evidence in a claim relating to a road traffic accident. Whilst the judge was not bound to accept the expert’s evidence if he had good reasons for not doing so, that such expert evidence did not accord with his own experience was insufficient ground for rejecting the evidence. The Court of Appeal also held that standard of care to be applied remained that of a reasonably prudent motorist and the court was not entitled to impos ...
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A Defendant In Breach Of Duty To Take Measurements Of Noise Levels Could Not Assert Noise Levels Not Excessive
The Court of Appeal allowed the appellant seaman’s appeal against the dismissal of his claim against the respondent ship-owner and in which it was alleged that it had negligently exposed him to excessive levels of noise on board its ships without providing ear protectors. The respondent had acted in breach of duty in failing to take measurements of the noise levels in its ships and such failure had put the appellant in difficulty in proving that he had negligently been exposed to excessive level ...
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Sugar v BBC & The Information Commissioner (No 2) [2010] EWCA Civ 715The BBC did not have to disclose a report on its reporting of events in the Middle East as at least one of the purposes for which that information was being held was a genuine journalistic purpose. It was incorrect to consider what was the ‘dominant purpose’ for which the information was held.
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Finding that gratuitously offensive insults and abuse breached Broadcasting Code was not a disproportionate interference with speaker’s freedom of expression
The finding by OFCOM that an interview conducted by the Claimant which degenerated into a shouting match, with the Claimant repeatedly calling his guest “a Nazi” and “a health Nazi” and with considerable venom, “you ignorant pig”, breached the Broadcasting Code was not a disproportionate interference with his freedom of expression or an infringement of his rights under Article 10, ECHR. That freedom of expression was to be accorded a high degree of protection, but it did not extend to gratuitous ...
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A claim for libel in respect of a letter which it was admitted had been published on an occasion of qualified privilege was struck out as there was no realistic prospect of establishing malice and defeating the defence.
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The Court of Appeal upheld Tugendhat J’s ruling, pursuant to s.69 of the Senior Courts Act 1981, that a libel trial should take place without a jury. The Court reaffirmed the constitutional importance of the right to trial by jury and emphasised that in apply s.69 care should be taken not to give too much independent weight to the increase in time and costs which a jury would involve.
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The definition of defamatory must include a qualification or threshold of seriousness, so as to exclude trivial claims. One of the passages that the Claimant complained of, suggesting that she effectively gave interviewees for her book copy approval (a practice which was said to be disapproved of by journalists), was either not defamatory of her at all or was below the threshold of seriousness. As such the complaint in respect of that passage was struck out.
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G was responsible for the establishment and maintenance of a standard form contract for the international trading of coal and coal derivatives (SCoTA) and related trading platform, data and indices. G’s product licensing agreement (PLA) for traders and brokers prohibited licensees from transacting with unlicensed third parties. L argued that G was not entitled to control absolutely the use of the SCoTA contract and its associated products but only to control the use of its IP rights in those pro ...
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