Day 077 - 25 Jan 95 - Page 06

     
     1        My Lord, as to the question, what is defamatory of a
     2        corporation, there is a classic piece of judicial
     3        expression of principle in the case of South Hetton Coal
     4        Company v. North-Eastern News Association Limited (1894) 1
     5        QB.  I have copied the relevant bits.  I will pass your
     6        Lordship what I conceive to be the relevant parts copy so
     7        your Lordship can write on it.  It is 1894 1 QB.
     8
     9   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Do you have a copy of this?
    10
    11   MS. STEEL:  No, we do not.
    12
    13   MR. RAMPTON:  I have just given a copy.  The headnote is very
    14        short.  It says:  "An action of libel will lie at the suit
    15        of an incorporated trading company in respect of a libel
    16        calculated to injure its reputation in the way of its
    17        business, without proof of special damage.
    18
    19        The sanitary condition of a large number of cottages let by
    20        the proprietors of a colliery to their workmen is a matter
         of public interest, fair comment on which is not
    22        libellous."
    23
    24        My Lord, the actual facts of the case do not matter in the
    25        very least.  The fact was that the company got, I think,
    26        £200, or it may have been £25, from a jury in respect of
    27        that allegation on the basis that it was made maliciously.
    28        But, my Lord, though in some sense, perhaps obiter, it is
    29        recognised as a classic exposition of what constitutes a
    30        libel on a company as opposed to an individual.  It appears
    31        at page 138 in the judgment of Lord Esher, Master of the
    32        Rolls.
    33
    34        My Lord, I will, if I may, read the whole of the relevant
    35        passage starting at about six lines at the end of the line
    36        with the word "I", just opposite the word "Eastern" in the
    37        margin.  The Master of the Rolls says:
    38
    39        "I have considered the case, and I have come to the
    40        conclusion that the law of libel is one and the same as to
         all plaintiffs; and that, in every action of libel, whether
    42        the statement complained of is, or is not, a libel, depends
    43        on the same question - viz., whether the jury of opinion
    44        that what has been published with regard to the plaintiff
    45        would tend in the minds of people of ordinary sense to
    46        bring the plaintiff into contempt, hatred, or ridicule, or
    47        to injure his character.  The question is really the same
    48        by whomsoever the action is brought - whether by a person,
    49        a  firm, or a company.  But though the law is the same, the
    50        application of it is, no doubt, different with regard to 
    51        different kinds of plaintiffs.  There are statements which, 
    52        with regard to some plaintiffs, would undoubtedly 
    53        constitute a libel, but which, if published of another kind
    54        of plaintiffs, would not have the same effect.  For
    55        instance, it might be stated of a person that his manners
    56        were contrary to all sense of decency or comity, and such
    57        that, if the statement were true, they would render him
    58        deserving in the minds of persons of ordinary sense of
    59        contempt, hatred or ridicule; but, if the same thing were
    60        said with regard to a firm, or company, it would be