Z & Ors v News Group Newspapers Ltd & Ors (Judgment 2)

When deciding whether to vary a reporting restriction after a criminal conviction, the court must balance Articles 8 and 10 without giving either automatic precedence. It must assess the comparative importance of the rights claimed, the justification for interference, and proportionality. The public interest in identifying a person convicted of fraud may prevail over family anonymity. That conclusion does not remove the continuing Article 8 rights of children and relatives. Restrictions may therefore remain necessary for names, photographs, medical information and precise locations where publication is likely to identify or intrude upon them.

The application concerned a Reporting Restriction Order made during ongoing criminal proceedings against Mrs Z. The earlier order protected the anonymity of Mrs Z and her children because the children’s medical records were expected to feature in the trial. After the criminal trial judge had completed the summing-up, the application was restored to determine what should happen if Mrs Z were convicted of any of 24 fraud counts.

The court considered the competing Article 8 rights of the family and Article 10 rights of the press, including whether Mrs Z could be named and what further information could be reported.

1. The court reaffirmed that Articles 8 and 10 have no automatic precedence over one another. The correct approach is to assess the comparative importance of the specific rights claimed, the justifications for interfering with each right, and proportionality. The court applied the approach in Re S (A Child) (Identification: Restriction of Publication) [2004] UKHL 47; [2005] 1 AC 593.
2. If Mrs Z were convicted, the factors which had previously favoured family privacy would be materially reduced. The balance would then favour Article 10. It would be unacceptable for the public not to know the name of a person convicted of fraud against the State. The court relied on the powerful, although obiter, observations in Re Trinity Mirror [2008] 2 Cr App R 1 concerning identification of persons convicted and sentenced for criminal offences.
3. Naming Mrs Z would create a risk that the children would be identified. That consequence did not justify maintaining complete anonymity for the convicted defendant, but the children remained entirely blameless and retained valuable Article 8 rights. The court therefore applied an intense and proportionate focus to each item of supporting information.
4. Conditional on a conviction, the Reporting Restriction Order was varied so as to prohibit publication of the children’s forenames, photographs, Mr Z’s forename, and medical conditions or disabilities not connected with Mrs Z’s benefit claims. The Crown Court, trial judge, county and fact that there were eight siblings could be reported. More specific location information remained restricted.

This was a first-instance determination on the restoration of an application previously considered by the High Court (Family Division) in [2013] EWHC 1150. The present judgment reconsidered the reporting restrictions in light of the possible conviction.