Defamation law proposal
Top lawmakers want dramatic reboot of current legislation
AUSTRALIA’S top lawmakers have proposed a dramatic reboot of defamation laws that could bring regulations into the “cyber age” by the middle of next year.
The rare agreement between federal and state Attorneys-General at a meeting in Adelaide yesterday has been hailed a victory for responsible public-interest journalism.
“Defamation law in Australia has had a massive reboot,” NSW Attorney-General Mark Speakman said.
“I’ve said a number of times that our defamation laws are no longer fit for purpose, they haven’t been looked at for about 14 years. But today, we have fixed that problem.”
The new provisions include a new single publication rule to ensure the limitation period for bringing action begins when material is uploaded to a website rather than each time it is downloaded. They also include a serious harm threshold, similar to laws in the UK and a public interest defence for public-interest journalism, relying on New Zealand laws.
“These reforms will unclog our courts of neighbourhood tiffs, they will put downward pressure on damages for hurt feelings and they will protect responsible, public-interest journalism,” Mr Speakman said yesterday.
Mr Speakman said the Government would invite public comment on the draft proposals by January 24 with all jurisdictions expected to introduce the measures by June, 2020.
A spokeswoman from Australia’s Right to Know coalition of media companies — which includes News Corp, publisher of the Gold Coast Bulletin — welcomed the sign off of the draft laws.
“We appreciate that the review has tackled both the need to ensure the law is fit for the digital age — noting the inclusion of a serious harm test and a single publication rule to apply to digital — and the need to update the laws to fix those parts of the law that do not work as intended,” the spokeswoman said.
Federal Attorney-General Christian Porter yesterday said it was impossible to underestimate the importance of the proposed reforms.
“These very significant reforms to the way in which defamation law should work in Australia have the agreement from both sides of politics, from the Commonwealth and every single state and territory as the logical starting point,” Mr Porter said.