![]() |
[Home] [Databases] [World Law] [Multidatabase Search] [Help] [Feedback] [DONATE] | |||||||||
England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions |
||||||||||
PLEASE SUPPORT BAILII & FREE ACCESS TO LAW
To maintain its current level of service, BAILII urgently needs the support of its users.
Since you use the site, please consider making a donation to celebrate BAILII's 25 years of providing free access to law. No contribution is too small. If every visitor this month gives just Β£5, it will have a significant impact on BAILII's ability to continue providing this vital service.
Thank you for your support! | ||||||||||
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions >> Blake & Ors v Fox [2023] EWCA Civ 1000 (25 August 2023) URL: https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2023/1000.html Cite as: [2023] EWCA Civ 1000 |
[New search]
[Context]
[View without highlighting]
[Printable PDF version]
[Help]
ON APPEAL FROM THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
KING'S BENCH DIVISION
MEDIA & COMMUNICATIONS LIST
Mr Justice Nicklin
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL |
||
B e f o r e :
LORD JUSTICE ARNOLD
and
LORD JUSTICE WARBY
____________________
(1) SIMON BLAKE (2) COLIN SEYMOUR (3) NICOLA THORP |
Claimants/ Respondents |
|
- and |
||
LAURENCE FOX |
Defendant/ Appellant |
____________________
Heather Rogers KC and Beth Grossman (instructed by Patron Law Limited) for the Respondents
Hearing date: 15 August 2023
____________________
Crown Copyright ©
LORD JUSTICE WARBY :
Introduction
The essential facts
"We are Celebrating Black History Month this October. For more information visit [website link given]. #blackhistorymonth"
The hyperlink included in this tweet linked to a page on Sainsbury's website which was headed: "Celebrating Black History Month". Under a sub-heading, "What we have been doing to support our colleagues", Sainsbury's included: "Recently we provided our black colleagues with a safe space to gather in response to the Black Lives Matters movement" ("the Sainsbury's Website BLM Statement").
"We are proud to celebrate Black History Month together with our Black colleagues, customers and communities and we will not tolerate racism.
We proudly represent and serve our diverse society and anyone who does not want to shop with an inclusive retailer is welcome to shop elsewhere."
"Dear @sainsburys
I won't be shopping in your supermarket ever again whilst you promote racial segregation and discrimination.
I sincerely hope others join me. RT.
Further reading here [website link given]"
Mr Fox's case is that the link given in his tweet was to the Sainsbury's Website BLM Statement. Mr Fox's tweet quote-tweeted the second Sainsbury's tweet.
(1) At 16.45, Ms Thorp tweeted:
"Any company giving future employment to Laurence Fox, or providing him with a platform, does so with the complete knowledge that he is unequivocally, publicly and undeniably a racist. And they should probably re-read their own statements of 'solidarity' with the black community."
(2) at 17.11, Mr Blake quote-tweeted Mr Fox's Sainsbury's tweet and said:
"What a mess. What a racist twat."
(3) at 17.19, Mr Seymour quote-tweeted Mr Fox's Sainsbury's tweet and said:
"Imagine being this proud of being a racist! So cringe. Total snowflake behaviour."
(1) at 17.29, in response to Mr Blake's tweet:
"Pretty rich coming from a paedophile."
(2) At 17.30, in response to Mr Seymour's tweet:
"Says the paedophile."
(3) At 17.51, in response to Ms Thorp's tweet:
"Hey @nicolathorp
Any company giving future employment to Nicola Thorpe (sic) or providing her with a platform does so with the complete knowledge that she is unequivocally, publicly and undeniably a paedophile."
"Language is powerful. To accuse someone of racism without any evidence whatsoever to back up that accusation is a deep slander. It carries the same stigma and reputation destroying harm as accusing someone of paedophilia. Here endeth the lesson."
The pleaded cases
"Although 'racist' is an ordinary English word requiring no definition, for the avoidance of any doubt it means someone who is hostile to people of different ethnicities, races or skin colours; and/or who believes that some racial or ethnic groups, or people with certain skin colours, are inferior to others; and/or who believes that people should be segregated based on their racial or ethnic origins or the colour of their skin "
(1) Mr Blake contended that the meaning of his tweet was that: "the defendant's latest Tweet about Sainsbury's was a 'mess' and showed that he was a 'Racist twat'".
(2) Mr Seymour contended that his tweet meant that: "the defendant's response to the action taken by Sainsbury's was cringeworthy and showed him to be a racist".
(3) Ms Thorp argued that the meaning of her tweet was that: "the defendant's public statements, including his response to Sainsbury's, showed him to be unequivocally, publicly and undeniably a racist".
(1) Each of the claimants maintained that the relevant tweet contained an allegation of fact that he or she
"was a paedophile, who had a sexual interest in children, and had (or was likely to have) engaged in sexual acts with or involving children, such acts amounting to serious criminal offences."
(2) Mr Fox denied that the paedophile tweets were defamatory
of any of the claimants. His pleaded case is that these tweets would not have been understood literally but rather as "tit-for-tat vulgar abuse". He pleaded that all readers of each of his tweets would have been aware that it was made in direct response to an allegation of racism against him by the particular claimant; that there was no apparent cause or reason for that claimant to allege that he was a racist; and that he was retaliating by calling that claimant a "paedophile". Mr Fox maintained that a reader of the paedophile tweets would have understood that he:-
"was making the rhetorical point that it was wrong to throw around seriouslydefamatory
allegations on Twitter without any factual foundation and that the Defendant was giving the Claimants a taste of their own medicine (accusing a serious but outlandish term which if a true allegation would not be made in these terms)."
Relevant legal principles
"Insults or abuse which convey nodefamatory
imputation are not actionable as
defamation.
Even if the words, taken literally and out of context, might be
defamatory,
the circumstances in which they are uttered may make it plain to the hearers that they cannot regard it as reflecting on the claimant's character so as to affect his reputation because they are spoken in the 'heat of passion, or accompanied by a number of non-actionable, but scurrilous epithets, e.g. a blackguard, rascal, scoundrel, villain, etc.' for the 'manner in which the words were pronounced may explain the meaning of the words.'"
This can be seen as a logical consequence of the law's concentration on the impact a statement would have on the ordinary reasonable reader and the way they would treat the claimant, and a reflection of the importance attributed to context and medium.
The judgment
"'Racist' is quintessentially one of those words. It almost invites the question from someone who hears the allegation: 'why did you say that?' It is very different from the allegation that somebody is a paedophile."
"That is one meaning that some readers may have thought his Tweets meant. It is not the natural and ordinary meaning. It is an extrapolation from the primary and obvious meaning of the words. It can only be arrived at after some interpretation. Such an interpretation would only emerge after some analysis. For many readers it is likely to be arrived at only if they had someone prompting them to consider whether the Tweet had a second theoretically or logically deducible meaning beyond its plain meaning. . The Defendant may have intended to convey this second meaning, but his intention is irrelevant to the objective single meaning of the Tweet."
The appeal
Discussion
Was the judge wrong to find that the claimants' tweets were all statements of opinion (ground one)?
Was the judge wrong to decline to define the term "racist" (ground three)?
Was the judge wrong to find that the opinion expressed by the claimants' tweets was not the limited one which the claimants themselves had pleaded as the meaning of those tweets (ground four)?
Was the judge wrong to decide that the paedophile tweets were statements of fact with the meaning he identified (grounds one and two)?
Conclusions
LORD JUSTICE ARNOLD:
LADY JUSTICE NICOLA DAVIES: