Sean Price v Newsquest Media Group Limited

In determining the natural and ordinary meaning of allegedly defamatory words, the court must assess the publication as a whole from the perspective of the hypothetical reasonable reader. That reader is neither naïve nor avid for scandal, and the court should avoid strained or over-elaborate analysis. Context, structure and punctuation may guide the reader’s impression, even where punctuation is not decisive. Where several matters appear in one connected passage, the reader may understand them as connected with the claimant without attributing a precise causal or legal relationship between them. The court may select the correct single meaning, subject to the pleaded meaning constraint. A meaning is defamatory at common law if it substantially adversely affects, or tends to affect, the attitude of others towards the claimant.

The claimant, a former chief constable, brought a libel claim concerning substantially identical online and newspaper articles published by the defendant. The articles stated that he had been dismissed for gross misconduct, referred to unlawful monitoring of journalists’ phones, and mentioned long-standing claims of racism within the police force.

Following an order by Nicklin J dated 28 September 2023, the court tried preliminary issues concerning the natural and ordinary meaning of the publications insofar as they concerned the claimant, and whether that meaning was defamatory at common law.

1. The court determined the single natural and ordinary meaning by applying the principles summarised in Koutsogiannis v Random House Group Limited [2020] 4 W.L.R. 25. The publication had to be read as a whole, in context and through the eyes of the hypothetical reasonable reader. The reader was not naïve, but was not unduly suspicious or avid for scandal. Over-elaborate analysis was to be avoided.
2. The relevant passage contained three strands: the claimant’s dismissal for gross misconduct; the investigation following unlawful monitoring of journalists’ phones; and long-standing claims of racism within the ranks. Their presentation in one sentence, separated from later events, and the absence of an explanation setting the dismissal apart, naturally connected all three strands with the claimant and his period as chief constable.
3. The court rejected an overly analytical attempt to identify the precise role played by the claimant in the latter two strands. The ordinary reader could understand the matters as connected with him without deciding whether they were causally connected to his dismissal or identifying a particular legal level of defamatory meaning. Analysis of the Chase levels was therefore unnecessary.
4. The natural and ordinary meaning was that the claimant had been sacked in 2012 for gross misconduct and was in some way implicated in the unlawful monitoring of journalists’ phones and the long-standing issue of racism within the force. That meaning substantially adversely affected, or tended to affect, the attitude of others towards him and was defamatory at common law, applying Triplark v Northwood Hall [2019] EWHC 3494 (QB) at [11].
5. The preliminary issues were determined accordingly. The claimant was ordered to pay the costs of and occasioned by the amendment to his particulars of claim; all other costs were reserved or otherwise left as stated in the judgment.

This was a first-instance preliminary issues trial. On 28 September 2023, Nicklin J ordered a trial of the meaning and defamatory-at-common-law issues.