Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer writes for Press Gazette about a new task force to tackle the rise of SLAPPs. for the Press Gazette
The UK Government is launching a task force to crack down on the growing number of SLAPP legal cases designed to intimidate journalists in the UK.
SLAPP stands for strategic litigation against public participation – meaning time-consuming and costly legal threats brought on supposed defamation and privacy grounds that are designed to stop critical reporting.
Data from the Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe found there were an estimated 14 SLAPP cases in England and Wales in 2021, up from two in both 2020 and 2019, and one in 2018.
Recent examples of cases seen by many as SLAPPs have included Russian oligarchs such as then-Chelsea FC owner Roman Abramovich targeting former FT Moscow correspondent Catherine Belton over her book Putin’s People (ultimately settled), a Kazakh mining giant’s case against journalist Tom Burgis, the FT and his book publisher Harper Collins that was thrown out by a judge, and Brexit donor Arron Banks’ libel action against Observer journalist Carol Cadwalladr (partly won on appeal with Cadwalladr ordered to pay £1m in costs and £35,000 in damages). The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, Open Democracy and The Telegraph are currently jointly facing a legal threat from Kazakhstan’s former dictator Nursultan Nazarbayev.
