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Max Mosley loses European Court privacy case

Tuesday 10 May 2011 10:00 EDT
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Ex-Formula One boss Max Mosley today lost his legal bid to make newspapers warn people before publishing stories about their private lives.

The European Court of Human Rights rejected his argument that "prior notification" should be compulsory for papers, to give their targets time to get an injunction preventing publication.

He is now considering an appeal and has threatened to continue his legal campaign following revelations about his sex life.

Mr Mosley said that if "prior notification" had been required at the time of News of the World's story, he would have "undoubtedly" have got an injunction to halt publication.

He said: "It's absolutely essential to do everything that you can to preserve people's privacy, people's freedom in that sense, and whatever I can do in that regard I'm going to do.

"Most of the people they publish this private information about probably have got the means to sue.

"In any of that, to go for an injunction is far less expensive than the final trial and if you get an injunction, generally speaking, there won't be a trial because the newspaper knows it's going to lose so they don't go on to trial.

"So in every way it's better that there should be notification, there should be injunctions."

Mr Mosley took his case to Strasbourg after the UK High Court ruled in 2008 that there was no justification for a front-page article and pictures in the News of the World about an orgy with five prostitutes in a London flat.

The paper had suggested that the sexual activities had "Nazi overtones" - something dismissed by the court.

Mr Mosley was awarded £60,000 damages, but vowed to pursue the case to Europe.

He argued that the media right under UK law to expose private behaviour without telling the "victim" breached his right to a private life, guaranteed by the Human Rights Convention.

But the court in Strasbourg said "prior notification" could have a "chilling effect" on journalism.

The seven Human Rights judges ruled that the right to freedom of expression - also guaranteed in the Convention - would be at risk if "pre-notification" was compulsory.

The court's verdict declared: "The European Convention on Human Rights does not require media to give prior notice of intended publications to those who feature in them."

Mr Mosley said: "I am disappointed at today's judgment, because I think that there is widespread recognition that privacy is fundamental to the way we live our lives. The potential for intrusion into our privacy is enormous and we need proper protection."

He added: "My experience, and the experience of countless others, is that UK tabloid newspapers such as the News of the World will stop at nothing to deny us privacy. They trade in sex scandals using countless techniques and 'dark arts' in the full knowledge that what they do ruins lives.

"I think it is wrong that they can continue to do this with impunity. I also think that imposing regulation on this trade in private information can be done without inhibiting public interest journalism."

Mr Mosley said he was discussing with his lawyers the prospect of a last appeal, to a 17-judge Chamber of the Human Rights Court. He has up to three months to submit an application.

Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke said there was no easy answer to the correct balance between the right to privacy and freedom of speech but "the Court of Human Rights seems to have decided that they think the British have got the balance about right at the moment".

Amber Melville-Brown, of international law firm Withers LLP, said the judgment was vital to protect free speech.

She said: "This is a success for the media, but it will be a success for society as a whole if the media will show equal measures of good sense in not abusing the trust the Human Rights Court has placed in it to act responsibly."

John Kampfner, chief executive of Index on Censorship, said: "The issue at stake here was not the sex lives of celebrities. Serious investigative journalism would have suffered.

"We are pleased that the court acknowledged that Mr Mosley's move would have inflicted a significant chilling effect on the media."

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