On 2 November, the BBC programme Newsnight broadcast an interview with former care home resident Steve Messham, in which he claimed to have been abused as a boy in the 1980s by a prominent Conservative politician.
After the programme was aired, there was a great deal of speculation on Twitter as to who the politician was, which made his name become a ‘trending topic’, even though Mr Messham immediately stated that the Tory peer was not his abuser.
Anyone posting material online is acting as a publisher, so their material is subject to the libel laws, even if they are repeating what someone else has instigated.
Consequently, the former politician’s lawyers are now going after the people who tweeted and retweeted and say that they have a list of names of those who posted on the subject and have appealed to them to come forward, apologise and settle financially.
Since millions of people who tweet have no knowledge of the law, they might argue that they are merely repeating the sort of gossip they might hear in the pub, but ignorance is no defence in this law, as the argument is that they must consider, before publishing to their audience, whether their comments would be considered defamatory.
It is possible in certain circumstances to argue what is commonly referred to as reportage, which is adopting a neutral approach to the allegation and simply reporting the facts, but since Newsnight didn’t name the politician, the reportage argument cannot be used.
If the former politician does bring libel claims against individual Twitter users, it will be a landmark case that could set a legal precedent for people who post comments on the internet.