Take 10: 10 July 2026

Welcome back to RPC's Media and Communications law update where we recap on the key media judgments and developments over the last few months.

"Article 10.1: Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers."

Vince v Tice appeal dismissed 

On 1 July 2026, the Court of Appeal handed down judgment in Vince v Tice [2026] EWCA Civ 844, dismissing Dale Vince's appeal. The case concerns a Tweet by Richard Tice MP, Deputy Leader of Reform UK, which quote-tweeted an article by Guido Fawkes, and added a statement of Tice's own. At a trial of preliminary issues, Pepperall J determined that the statement complained of meant that Vince, a green energy entrepeneur, “supports the murderous and antisemitic terrorist organisation Hamas”, that it was a statement of opinion, and that it indicated the basis for the opinion (see our previous reporting on the judgment here). Vince appealed against the finding that the statement was one of opinion, and, in the alternative, against the ruling on meaning.

The Court of Appeal emphasised at the outset that appeals against decisions on meaning and fact/opinion are rare and will only succeed whether the appeal court is satisfied that the finding was wrong in law [2-3].

Rejecting the first ground, the Court of Appeal held that Pepperall J had been entitled to consider whether Tice's own extra statement, read in the context of the quote-tweet as a whole, was one of fact or opinion (and not whether the whole tweet, including the quote-tweet, was a statement of fact or opinion) [45-46] and to conclude that the statement was one of opinion [48]. The Court of Appeal rejected Vince's argument that, in order to rely on the honest opinion defence, a statement must be "obviously" one of opinion. A test of obviousness would set the bar too high, and there is no support for such a principle in the authorities [48].

By his second ground, Vince challenged the judge's ruling on meaning, arguing that the judge was wrong not to include discrete defamatory allegations of fact within the meaning, namely the allegations in the quoted tweet and article from Guido Fawkes [50 – 52]. This was a new argument, not advanced to the court below, and which was inconsistent with Vince's earlier position. The Court of Appeal held that it would be unjust to permit the new case to be advanced [64].

Unlawful information gathering claims against Associated Newspapers Limited dismissed

The Court has dismissed the claims of seven Claimants for misuse of private information (and, in one claim, breach of confidence) arising from alleged unlawful information gathering ("UIG") by the publisher of the Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday and MailOnline inVarious Claimants v Associated Newspapers Limited [2026] EWHC 1637 (KB).  The Claimants included the Duke of Sussex, Baroness Lawrence, Elton John and Liz Hurley.

The Court found that the Claimants had failed to prove any of their pleaded allegations of UIG (which included allegations of voicemail interception, phone tapping, obtaining information by deception and the use of private investigators to commit these acts), recognising that the seriousness of the allegations required convincing evidence.  Much of the Claimants' cases relied on inference or 'propensity evidence'.  This was not enough – the Claimants had to prove that the information complained of had been obtained unlawfully and they failed to do so.  ANL called journalist witnesses who denied UIG and gave lawful explanations for the sourcing of the disputed articles and incidents.  The Court accepted their evidence and rejected the Claimants' argument that, where ANL could not positively explain how an article which contained private information was sourced, it "must have been unlawfully sourced".  It also rejected the Claimants' argument that knowingly false evidence had been given to the Leveson Inquiry by ANL.

ANL had also relied on a limitation defence in the alternative.  Due to the dismissal of the claims on their merits it was not necessary for the Court to decide limitation in relation to most of the claims.  It did, however, decide that claims by two of the Claimants (Simon Hughes and Sadie Frost Law) arising from a series of emails would have been statute-barred in any event on the basis that they both had actual (and in the alternative, constructive) knowledge of relevant facts to bring a claim over six years before their claims were ultimately issued.

A two-day consequentials hearing has been listed for 29-30 July.

Anonymity protections for firearms officers come into force

On 29 June 2026, sections 200 – 203 of the Crime and Police Act 2026 came into force providing anonymity protections for authorised firearms officers charged with qualifying offences arising from the use of lethal firearms while acting in the course of their duties. Unless contrary to the interests of justice, the court (1) must order that the Defendant's name, address and date of birth be withheld from the public in proceedings (section 200(3)); (2) must give a reporting direction prohibiting any identification of the defendant in the public (including images of the Defendant, and the Defendant's place of work) (sections 200(3)(b) and 202); and (3) may make an anonymity order requiring specific measures to be taken to withhold the defendant's identity from the public – such as screening and voice modulation (sections 200 and 203). Restrictions will apply from the point of charge until conviction and/or sentencing, although they may be ordered for a fixed period of time (sections 200(1), 200(5) and 202(5)). Similar restrictions also apply in the case of appeals (section 201). Many will see this as a blow to open justice due to the default position being anonymity for officers involved. For our previous reporting on these provisions see here.

Graveley v Schestowitz – Court labels litigant-in-person's Defence "wholly non-compliant" and counterclaim "totally without merit"  

The Defendant, a free software advocate, published a series of articles about the Claimant on his website techrights.org. One article referred to the Claimant, a software developer, as a "serial strangler" who strangled "numerous women" [4]. The claimant sued in libel, malicious falsehood and breach of the UK GDPR, and the Defendant (a litigant-in-person) counter-claimed in harassment.

On 26 June 2026, DHCJ Guy Vassal-Adams KC gave summary judgment for the Claimant on the Defendant's counterclaim and struck out the remainder of the Defendant's Defence. The Defendant's harassment counterclaim was based solely on the fact of the Claimant bringing proceedings against him. The immunity from suit principle (under which parties should be able to bring and conduct litigation without fear of being sued for merely doing so) was a complete answer to the counterclaim [18-19].

The Court struck out the remainder of the Defence for non-compliance with CPR 16.5 and PD 53B, noting that, as per Rzucek, litigants in person are not exempt from compliance with the rules [23]. The Defence was excessively long, unfocussed and incoherent [27]. It was an abuse of the court's process as it had been used as a "vehicle for conspiracy theories, personal vendettas and diatribes", and frustrated the very purpose of a defence by making it hard to work out what the Defendant's actual defence was [28]. Recognising the difficulties facing litigants in person drafting statements of case, the court gave clear guidance for the Defendant to file an Amended Defence [31-35] 

Data protection claim dismissed: First test of the journalism exemption in relation to Subject Access Requests (SARs)

On 24 June 2026, District Judge Clarke dismissed a data protection claim in what appears to be the first court test of the journalism exemption regarding SARs. The data protection claim was brought against news publisher Mill Media by TV historian Laurence Westgaph who had been accused of improper conduct by multiple previous partners. Following the Mill Media's reporting of the allegations, the Claimant submitted six SARs to Mill Media. Before Mill Media could refuse the requests on the basis of the journalistic exemption, Westgaph filed a County Court claim for damages for emotional distress and reputational harm, and his legal costs. Whilst the Defendant's response to the SARs was held to be a "full and compliant DSAR response", the Defendant was held to have breached Article 12(3) of the UK GDPR for providing this response 22 days late. This breach was described, however, by the judge as "trivial" and the court found the Claimant had suffered no distress as a result of this breach. All other claims against Mill Media were dismissed with no order as to costs. The judgment signifies the importance of the journalism exemption in protecting source information for media organisations faced with a SAR. Mill Media told the Press Gazette that the £75,000 incurred expenses during the trial were necessary to "establish an important principle in the UK courts, which is that the journalism exemption can be enforced under GDPR".

UKJT publish Legal Statement on Liability for Non-Deliberate AI Harms

Following a consultation earlier this year, the UK Jurisdiction Taskforce (UKJT), a taskforce established by LawtechUK, the Ministry of Justice-backed initiative aimed at driving digital transformation in the legal sector, has published its legal statement on liability for non-deliberate AI harms. The statement seeks to address whether, and if so on what legal bases, English law can provide adequate redress for non-deliberate harms caused by the use of AI.

The general observations made by the UKJT on liability for any such harms under defamation law will be of interest to media practitioners, particularly those involved in the roll-out of AI-created journalistic content.

The UKJT statement suggests that liability as a 'publisher' could be wide-ranging, envisaging that it could attach to actors adopting a manual, editorial role over an AI model's output before publication, developers or hosting suppliers who choose to deploy AI to publish statements to the public in the course of their business, and even foundation model developers whose only involvement is that they have licenced their model to a publisher where they are on notice of a defamatory statement coming from their AI model and they have sufficient practical ability to control the model's output. The UKJT statement also considers the impact on the statutory and common law defences available in defamation law.  For example, while it considers that the truth and 'reporting privilege' defences will likely be available to defendants in defamation proceedings involving public-facing AI models, the same is not true for the statutory defences of honest opinion and public interest. Both defences require the subjective belief of a legal person – AI is not a legal person and incapable of holding an opinion or a belief. The position as regards a prospective public interest defence may well be different if an actor becomes aware of the publication via a manual review and forms a reasonable belief that it was in the public interest.

While the UKJT's statement is not binding authority, the Master of the Rolls's foreword, in which he states that it seeks to provide "much needed legal certainty and legal predictability" in an area with limited applicable case law, suggests that it may well be given weight by the Courts going forwards.

Drabble & Anor v Bramhall – Facebook posts against parish councillors considered defamatory

At a meaning hearing, Mrs Justice Hill held the Defendant's two posts on a local community Facebook group about two parish councillors (the Claimants) were defamatory. Hill J determined that the first post meant that the First Claimant (i) had driven a motor vehicle around the community centre while "high" on illegal drugs; (ii) had a knife in his possession which was seized by the police and put in an evidence bag; and (iii) had falsely claimed, or materially exaggerated, that he had been kicked in the face while on the ground. Meanings (i) and (ii) were held to be Chase Level 1 statements of fact given they "baldly asserted" that the First Claimant was guilty of the acts alleged. Whilst the Defendant stated there were "2 sides to a story" later on in the post this only came after statements (i) and (ii) had already been asserted. Statement (iii) was considered a statement of opinion as the Defendant based his comment on the police's "forensic proof". Whilst the Defendant did not name the First Claimant as the individual who made the alleged false claim, the court held the ordinary reasonable reader would infer it related to the First Claimant given it came shortly after discussing the First Claimant, who was also the victim of the attack. The court did not consider, however, that it implied the First Claimant was generally dishonest.

In relation to the Second Claimant, Hill J held the post meant (i) the Second Claimant had spoken and behaved in a way that was wholly inappropriate for a parish councillor, and (ii) because of this, she was unfit for her public and community role. The statements were considered to be statements of opinion due to their critical nature. Hill J did not consider that the post meant that the Second Claimant was involved in making false claims regarding the alleged attack on the First Claimant as there was no direct reference to her, and she wasn't the victim of the attack.

Ofcom publishes changes to its Illegal Harms regulatory documents and guidance on new priority offences (serious self-harm and cyberflashing)

On 25 June 2026, Ofcom published a statement confirming the proposals set out in its March 2026 Consultation to update its regulatory documents to combine the offence of encouraging or assisting suicide and the new offence of encouraging or assisting serious self-harm into a single kind of illegal harm, 'suicide and self-harm', and to include cyberflashing as a new, and separate, kind of illegal harm. The consultation followed the creation of two new priority offences (encouraging or assisting serious-self harm and cyberflashing) under the Act in December 2025. Ofcom has published draft amendments to its Risk Assessment Guidance and the Illegal Content Codes of Practice.

Providers of regulated services will need to review and update their illegal content risk assessments to assess the risks of the new kinds of illegal harm on their service, and apply the measures recommended in the Codes to mitigate the risks of suicide and self-harm and cyberflashing, or take alternative effective measures to manage these risks.

Ofcom announces new code for BBC online content following expansion of regulatory powers 

On 2 July, Ofcom announced changes to its regulation of the BBC, publishing a proposed new code for BBC online material. The code is intended to introduce enforceable rules for BBC content published online. Ofcom is inviting responses on the proposals until 27 August 2026 and expects to publish a final decision later this year. These developments follow the Government’s BBC Mid-Term Review, which extended Ofcom’s powers to cover BBC online material. Ofcom identifies impartiality and the protection of under 18s as crucial issues to focus on under the new code.

Also on 2 July, Ofcom published a protocol that it has agreed with the BBC, setting out how it will increase its oversight of complaints made to the BBC. This reflects changes made to the Charter in 2025 as a result of the Mid -Term Review to give Ofcom has a new duty to regularly review a sample of complaints that reach the BBC's 'stage 2' process (the point at which they are escalated to the BBC's Executive Complaints Unit). 

House of Commons debate on SLAPPs

A Commons debate on the impact of strategic litigation against public participation (SLAPPs), sponsored by Alex Sobel MP, which was scheduled for yesterday afternoon has been postponed until September 2026.  The date and time of the debate will be published in due course.  The debate will be broadcast online on UK Parliament TV here.

Quote of the fortnight

“Appeals of this kind are rare. Such decisions are findings of fact. An appeal can succeed if the court is persuaded that the Judge’s approach was vitiated by a material error of law, but that very seldom happens. Judges of the Media and Communications List are very familiar with deciding these issues, which are frequently tried as preliminary issues in defamation claims. The applicable law is well-established, and clearly encapsulated in the decision of Nicklin J in Koutsogiannis v The Random House Group Ltd [2019] EWHC 48 (QB), [2020] 4 WLR 25 [11]-[17], the case which is usually cited to the trial Judge, as it was here. The decision-making process is comparatively simple. The key question for the Judge is how the statement would strike the ordinary reasonable reader. Ordinarily, no evidence is admissible other than the statement itself. The answer is very much a matter of impression. Over-elaborate analysis is to be avoided. On this appeal it is not suggested that the Judge’s approach to the issue of meaning or to whether the statement was one of fact or opinion was wrong in law."

Lord Justice Warby in Vince v Tice [2026] EWCA Civ 844

Brought to you by RPC's Media team