British lawyer supports changes to defamation laws

A United Kingdom attorney-at-law has suggested that restrictions be placed on awards for damages brought against Jamaican media houses in defamation suits, as he believes existing figures are far too high.

Mark Stephens, of UK law firm Finer Stephens Innocent, was addressing yesterday's sitting of a joint select committee of Parliament set up to examine the report of a Hugh Small-chaired committee set up to review Jamaica's defamation laws.

Stephens, who represented former government minister Anthony Abrahams in a libel case brought against The Gleaner two decades ago, said the amounts awarded by local apellate courts were excessive in comparison to those handed down in the UK.

"The one thing that struck me fairly hard was that the awards made and upheld by the Court of Appeal here were significantly higher than the awards would have been, had those same cases, (based) on the same facts, occurred in London," Stephens told the committee.

In the Abrahams case, the Supreme Court awarded damages of J$80.7 million (£1.2 million) in 1996. In 2000, the Court of Appeal reduced the award to J$35 million (£533,000).

Stephens said the ability of persons in Jamaica to pay awards of that level, compared to persons in London, needed to be taken into account, noting that libel damages for pain and suffering in the UK were currently capped at £250,000.

The UK attorney also suggested that a one-year limitation period for filing a defamation suit from the publication of the defamatory statement, as indicated in the Small Report, be taken into consideration by the committee. The current limitation period is six years.

Backed call for removal

Stephens strongly backed the Small Report's call for the removal of the multiple publication rule, with the single publication rule, where the limitation period for defamatory material would commence on the date the material was first published.

Under the existing multiple publication rule, each publication of defamatory material can form the basis of a new defamation claim.

Stephens added that the single publication rule would also bring Jamaica in line with United States laws, as well as civil law in other jurisdictions throughout the world.

On the issue of the defence of triviality, Stephens noted there should be evidence of substantial harm before action was taken.

He added that any issues relating to damage to a person's reputation needed to be shown instead of being merely presumed.