The Australian defamation payout that has Whitehall’s media lawyers sharpening their pencils. Alan Jones, the former king of shock jock radio, has been awarded A$12 million (£6.2 million) in damages against News Corp. The verdict landed like a bomb in Sydney’s Federal Court. It was the biggest defamation payout in Australian history. And it is sending shivers through the Westminster village.
Jones sued over a series of articles published in 2019 and 2020 by The Australian, a broadsheet owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. The articles alleged Jones had harassed the mother of a murdered Sydney teenager. The jury found they were defamatory. The judge agreed. The sum was enormous. But it is the implications that matter.
Here’s the inside baseball. UK defamation law was overhauled in 2013 to stop the “libel tourism” that made London the capital of global defamation. The Defamation Act 2013 introduced a “serious harm” threshold. It was meant to tilt the playing field away from plaintiffs. Critics say it tilted too far. The Jones payout is a powerful piece of ammunition for those who want to reverse that tilt.
Conservative backbenchers have been grumbling for years. They say the 2013 Act has made it too easy for the press to smear individuals. One senior Tory told me the law is “a charter for the bullies in the newsroom.” The Jones case gives them a concrete example. A$12 million. That is more than the entire annual libel budget for some UK publishers.
The Prime Minister’s spokesman was non-committal when I asked this morning. “We keep media law under constant review,” he said. But the PM knows the politics. The right of the party wants a tougher line on the press. The left wants to protect investigative journalism. A split that could be exploited.
There is also a twist in the tale. Jones is a divisive figure. He was a close ally of the former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott. His on-air outbursts were infamous. He called for the Queen to be “dumped” as head of state. He called the late Prince Philip a “disease.” Yet the jury was unimpressed with News Corp’s defence.
The Attorney General’s office is watching closely. A source there told me they were “examining the judgment in detail.” That is code for: we are considering a review. But don’t expect any immediate action. The government has bigger fish to fry. A cost of living crisis. A war in Ukraine. A partygate inquiry.
But the lobby is buzzing. This is a gift for the trial lawyers. The litigation funding firms are circling. They see a new market. I spoke to one libel specialist this afternoon. He said: “The 2013 Act was meant to stop jackpot justice. This Australian award shows jackpot justice is alive and well. The question is whether we want a bit of it here.”
The parallels with the UK are striking. News Corp also owns The Sun and The Times. Its UK operations are huge. A similar award here would send shockwaves through Fleet Street. The senior editors I spoke to were tight-lipped. But they are worried. One said: “This could be a game changer. It changes the calculus. Suddenly, the risk of losing a libel case goes up exponentially."
The next move is with the Ministry of Justice. They are due to publish a post-legislative review of the 2013 Act. It has been delayed. Twice. The Jones verdict adds a new urgency. The review was supposed to be a dry, technical exercise. Now it could become a political football.
The shadow justice secretary welcomed the review. He said: “We need to ensure that the law protects the vulnerable from being smeared by powerful media conglomerates.” That is code for: we will use this to bash the Tories for being too cosy with Murdoch.
Watch this space. The Jones payout is not a direct precedent for UK courts. Our system is different. But the political momentum it creates is real. The backbenchers are mobilising. The lawyers are queueing. And the publishers are starting to sweat.
