Duke wins the first stage of libel claim

The Duke of Sussex has won the first stage of his libel claim against the publisher of The Mail on Sunday after a High Court judge ruled an article about the duke’s legal claim against the Home Office was defamatory.

Harry is suing Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) after the paper ran a story following the first hearing in the duke’s separate High Court claim over his security arrangements when he is in the UK.

The piece was published in February under the headline: “Exclusive: How Prince Harry tried to keep his legal fight with the government over police bodyguards a secret... then – just minutes after the story broke – his PR machine tried to put a positive spin on the dispute.”

At a preliminary hearing in June, Mr Justice Nicklin was asked to determine the “natural and ordinary” meaning of the article and whether it was defamatory.

In a ruling yesterday, the judge ruled the article was defamatory, later adding this was “very much the first phase” of the libel claim.

Mr Justice Nicklin said a normal reader would understand from the article that Harry “was responsible for public statements, issued on his behalf, which claimed that he was willing to pay for police protection in the UK, and that his legal challenge was to the government’s refusal to permit him to do so, whereas the true position, as revealed in documents filed in the legal proceedings, was that he had only made the offer to pay after the proceedings had commenced”.

He also said the article would have been read as giving the opinion that Harry “was responsible for trying to mislead and confuse the public as to the true position, which was ironic given that he now held a public role in tackling ‘misinformation”’.

Mr Justice Nicklin added: “It may be possible to ‘spin’ facts in a way that does not mislead, but the allegation being made in the article was very much that the object was to mislead the public. That supplies the necessary element to make the meanings defamatory at common law.”

The senior judge also found that the article did not suggest that Harry “was seeking to keep his ‘legal battle’ with the government secret”, though this might be suggested by the headline if read alone.

Yesterday’s judgment only relates to the “objective meaning” of the article, Mr Justice Nicklin said. ANL will now have the opportunity to file a defence to the duke’s claim.

A decision on whether this claim can proceed will be given at a later date.

ACTION: Harry is suing Associated Newspapers Limited.