Cheshire West and Chester Council & Ors v Pickthall

An interim injunction may restrain publications amounting to harassment where the claimant is likely to establish at trial that the defendant cannot rely on a statutory defence. Under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, the defence of preventing or detecting crime requires a rational, good-faith logical connection between the evidence, the perceived criminality and the conduct pursued. It is less demanding than reasonableness, but it is not satisfied by obsession, persistence or a subjective belief unsupported by evidence. Article 10 protects robust public criticism of public officials, but that protection is not unlimited. A proportionate injunction may restrain vitriolic personal abuse while permitting lawful publication and applications to vary the order.

The claimants sought an interim injunction under sections 3 and 3A of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. The first claimant was a local authority. The remaining claimants were its employees, officers and councillors, and also claimed representatively for others in those categories.

The defendant had conducted a prolonged campaign involving emails, leaflets, websites and social-media publications. The publications made allegations of corruption, criminality and dishonesty against council employees, officers and councillors. He relied principally on the statutory defence that his conduct was pursued to prevent or detect crime, and also invoked the public interest and freedom of expression.

The central questions were whether the claimants were likely to establish harassment at trial, whether the defendant was likely to establish a statutory defence, and whether an injunction would be a proportionate restriction on his Article 10 rights.

1. Interim relief. The court granted an injunction in principle. The claimants were likely to establish that the defendant had pursued a course of conduct amounting to harassment, involving speech which caused, and was intended to cause, distress. The application was assessed by reference to the likelihood that the claimants would establish at trial that the defendant could not rely on any statutory defence.
2. Rationality under section 1(3)(a). Applying Hayes v Willoughby [2013] 1 WLR 935, the court held that the defence of conduct pursued to prevent or detect crime requires a good-faith thought process and a logical link between the evidence, the perceived criminality and the conduct. The test is less demanding than reasonableness, but it requires rational assessment and excludes arbitrary or obsessive conduct.
3. The defendant had produced no reliable evidence of the alleged criminal conduct. His historic housing dispute could not rationally justify current allegations against unrelated council personnel. Nor could the alleged land irregularities, the council’s single-point-of-contact system, or the supposed suppression of evidence rationally further the prevention or detection of crime. His continued campaign had become a vendetta without a logical causal connection to the stated purpose.
4. Freedom of expression. Applying the approach in Cream Holdings Ltd v Banerjee [2005] 1 AC 253, the court had to be satisfied that the claimants were likely to establish at trial that further publication should not be permitted, with particular regard to Article 10. Public officials and elected politicians are subject to public scrutiny, but that interest does not extend to unlimited vitriolic personal abuse. The restriction was proportionate.
5. The order did not prohibit the defendant from using his website altogether. He was required to edit it so that it complied with the injunction, or take it down temporarily if that could not be done. He retained liberty to apply on notice, supported by evidence, to vary the order. Costs were reserved to trial.