Dear Colin et al;
Thanks, this is a very interesting decision. It seems to me that malicious falsehood is going to undergo something of a renaissance in Australia in the next few years, now that our uniform defamation legislation mostly removes the action for defamation from companies with more than 10 employees- see eg Defamation Act 2005 (NSW) s 9. Hence this decision will be interesting persuasive fodder for malicious falsehood actions taken by companies.
Regards
Neil
On 04/06/2010, at 11:28 PM, Colin Liew wrote:
Dear all,
The English Court of Appeal in
Ajinomoto Sweeteners Europe SA v ASDA Stores Ltd [2010] EWCA Civ 609 has declined to hold that the single meaning rule (i.e. that if a word or phrase is reasonably capable of bearing more than one meaning, the least offensive meaning is that which is attributed to the reasonable reader of that word or phrase) in the tort of defamation applies also to the tort of malicious falsehood.
This was mainly because, according to the Court of Appeal, the single meaning rule was artificial and anomalous even in the tort of defamation, and capable of producing injustice, and therefore should not be extended outside the realms of defamation.
Regards,
Colin Liew
Neil Foster
Senior Lecturer, LLB Program Convenor,
Newcastle Law School Faculty of Business & Law
MC158, McMullin Building
University of Newcastle Callaghan NSW 2308 AUSTRALIA
ph 02 4921 7430 fax 02 4921 6931