UPDATE : Kostas Vaxevanis was acquitted of breaking data privacy laws on 1 November

UPDATE: Since this article was published, journalist Spiros Karatzaferis was arrested on an outstanding charge after claiming he would publish classified documents relating to Greece’s financial bailout. Read here

In recent months Greece has recorded multiple instances of censorship and attacks on the press. Systematic efforts to curtail media freedom are taking place against a backdrop of rising police brutality used to quell anti-austerity protests and mounting neo-Nazi violence against journalists, immigrants, and homosexuals linked to rise of the far-right Golden Dawn party, which gained 18 seats in June’s parliamentary elections (having achieved a record 21 seats in the May election).

28 October, National Day in Greece, saw the arrest of investigative journalist Kostas Vaxevanis, whose Hot Doc magazine published a leaked list (nicknamed the “Lagarde list”) of over 2,000 names of Greeks with bank accounts in Switzerland. Reporters Sans Frontieres appealed for his release, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Dunja Mijatović, expressed her concern, and netizens rallied to his support on Twitter, gathering over 16,000 signatures on a petition demanding that charges be dropped, as did the European Federation of Journalists.

“They are after me instead of  the truth,” Vaxevanis stated in a video uploaded on the night before his arrest.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNkCcgh5mUYA

A New York Times editorial slammed the Greek government for being “shamefully quick” to attack the messenger and strip basic social services from the country’s most vulnerable citizens but shamefully slow at probing possible tax evasion by the well-connected. Vaxevanis, whose magazine has been steadily publishing investigative reports on graft and corruption scandals, had reported a seemingly abortive ambush at his home on the northern suburbs of Athens earlier in September by five unknown individuals.

Several other incidents of censorship have plagued the media in the last month, leading to international condemnation and grave concerns about the state of democracy in its nominal birthplace.

On 25 September, a 27-year-old netizen was remanded to trial on blasphemy charges for maintaining a Facebook page titled “Gerontas Pastitsios” (Elder Pastitsios), which included satirical comments on Christianity and the noted Eastern Orthodox monk Elder Paisios and his alleged “prophecies”, as well as the commercial exploitation of Paisios’s legacy. The matter was raised by a member of parliament from Golden Dawn. According to the defendant, the blasphemy charge was later dropped, but he still faces defamation and insult charges over third-party comments left on the Facebook page (he maintains he never defamed or used abusive language himself, and even deleted abusive comments).

On 9 October, the Guardian published a report by the Nation’s Maria Margaronis on torture allegations made by anti-fascist protesters arrested after a clash with Golden Dawn members on 26 September, in which detainees spoke of being subjected to an “Abu Ghraib-style humiliation” at police headquarters in Athens. The Μinister of Public Order, Nikos Dendias, later announced his intention to sue the British newspaper for defamation and instead of ordering a public inquiry while investigating the torture allegations in a “sworn administrative inquiry”, a process described by the UNHCR in 2008 as an internal and confidential police procedure designed to protect the rights of the officer involved rather than those of the complainant.

On 11 October, religious groups and neo-Nazis protested against the gay-themed play Corpus Christi in Athens, deeming it blasphemous; they assaulted a theatre critic and forced the cancellation of the performance. Five days later, Greek public television channel NET censored a gay kiss scene from the British TV series Downton Abbey. Management apologised after a furore online against censorship, and rebroadcast the episode uncensored.

On 26 October, ERT3 state TV reporter Christos Dantsis, assigned to cover the celebrations of the liberation centenary of Thessaloniki, “disappeared” on screen, after reporting on citizen protests against the Greek Prime Minister and President of the Republic outside St Dimitrios’ church and the heavy police presence that had descended on the city. His substitute was ordered to present a more amicable image of festivities.

On 28 October, a 35-year-old man arrested in Corfu for posting photos of police and Golden Dawn on Facebook during the Ochi Day parade, was reportedly charged with breaching privacy, defamation and “spreading false news with the intent to destabilise the state”.

The following day, two journalists, Kostas Arvanitis and Marilena Katsimi, had their morning news show on Greek state TV (ERT) cancelled, after analysing claims by the Guardian of police torture of Greek anti-fascist protesters in Athens, and criticising the Greek Minister of Public Order, Nikos Dendias.Katsimi told the Guardian:

About an hour after the programme ended, the director of information called for a transcript. He didn’t ask to talk to us. And it was then announced that two other journalists would present tomorrow’s show. We were cut.

Aimilios Liatsos, ERT’s general director, defended his decision and stated that the two journalists “violated minimum standards of journalistic ethics”. Various political parties and organizations have condemned ERT’s action, while journalists at ERT/NET launched a 24-hour rolling strike as of 30 October, until the decision on Arvanitis and Katsimi is withdrawn.

In reaction to these developments, The Nation’s Maria Maragaronis argues:

Greece can no longer be called a functioning democracy [...], as press freedom, always precarious in Greece where most private media are in the hands of well-connected oligarchs, is a dead letter.

David Hughes of the Daily Telegraph underlines that “press freedom is under threat in Greece and the EU doesn’t seem to care”.  Yiannis Baboulias similarly accuses European leaders of treating what is happening in Greece as a national problem, predicting in a New Statesman article that “they’re holding the door open for their countries to go down the same path”.

2006, where it all began…

An apparent lack of Internet policy and judicial ignorance of the nature of the internet had led to the first publicised incident of online censorship in Greece in October 2006. During the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) held in Athens, news emerged that Greek authorities had arrested Antonis Tsipropoulos, a Greek aggregation service administrator, and confiscated his hard drives, for linking to US-hosted blog posts that satirised Greek businessman and tele-evangelist Dimosthenis Liakopoulos. Bloggers organised a massive online solidarity campaign and held courtside protests, declaiming the lack of web savvy of the complainant and the court, as well as the technophobe spirit of the time. Tsipropoulos’ case was mired in legal limbo for years, as often happens in similar cases. Subsequent attempts over the years by Greek governments to institute “anti-blog laws” — similar to ones recently enacted in Jordan, Zambia and Malawi, among others — that would enforce mandatory registration and hold bloggers accountable for third-party comments, were held in check by netizen initiatives.

Rising encroachment of press freedom

Overt press censorship is banned by the Greek Constitution, but systematic efforts to curtail press freedom have intensified in recent years, as unpopular austerity measures, corruption scandals and police violence are fueling frequent protests and dissent. Greece notably plummeted 35 ranks in the Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders in 2010, in large part due to the assassination of online journalist Sokratis Giolias, allegedly because of his work on an undisclosed corruption story, and targeted police attacks on photojournalists covering protests. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and other international human rights organisations have repeatedly chastised the Greek state, urging a “zero tolerance” approach to police violence. Threats and abuse against journalists by newly-elected politicians from the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party prompted CPJ to remark that the party “casts a shadow on Europe’s press freedom”.

While Greece is widely and casually demonised as “patient zero” of the European financial crisis, politicians and the media are routinely displaying a callous shortsightedness in addressing its corrosive effects on press freedom and free speech,  eating away at the core values that made the European Union a necessary reality. This is, in large part, to oppose the spectre of totalitarianism ever rising again in the continent.

As Kostas Vaxevanis has written: “Greece gave birth to democracy. Now it has been cast out by a powerful elite”.

Asteris Masouras and Veroniki Krikoni are Global Voices authors and editors of Global Voices in Greek

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As over 50 international human rights NGOs have pointed out in a letter to Prime Minister David Cameron today, a damning report by the UN Human Rights Committee on English libel law spurred the calls for action to change the law. But with the government’s defamation bill merely codifying important sections of the law in statute, it remains to be seen whether they will deliver on the commitments made by the coalition parties at the last general election. The Libel Reform Campaign is calling for the House of Lords to make substantive amendments to the bill, in particular a new public interest defence and amendments to the “responsible journalism” defence; a new clause to strike out actions by corporations, an amendment forcing early strike out of trivial cases and improvements on regulations covering the internet. It’s time to get this right.

We need a public interest defence – now
Without a public interest defence in the Bill, this legislation will fall far short of initial expectations. Previous libel defendants Simon Singh and Dr Peter Wilmshurst have told the campaign that the provisions in this Bill would have done nothing to protect them in their cases. Clause 4 of the bill as it stands is merely the codification of a version of the existing Reynolds “responsible journalism” defence — it is not a public interest defence. In the Reynolds judgement (the 1999 House of Lords judgment in Reynolds vs Times Newspapers Ltd), Lord Nicholls suggested 10 criteria that could be used to measure whether a publication had been responsible. Although these criteria were meant to be illustrative they have come to be seen as a list of requirements to be satisfied. While a large newspaper group may be able to satisfy these criteria (albeit at huge expense), for bloggers, scientists or NGOs this is simply not practical. A better defence for large media organisations can be created by updating the bill to reflect the latest case law, in particular the summary by Lord Justice Brown in Flood vs Times. This should be included in the Bill either by deleting the entirety of the existing Clause 4 to keep the existing common law position which is stronger than the position in the Bill; or, more suitably (to create legal certainty) by amending the existing Clause 4. This amendment would at least give large media groups a reliable “responsible journalism” defence.

Last chance to demand Libel Reform. England’s libel laws are unjust, against the public interest and internationally criticised. Join 60,000 others calling for change. Sign here.

However, a “responsible journalism” defence will not protect the bloggers, scientists and NGOs who have driven the Libel Reform Campaign. Some MPs have responded to calls for a public interest defence, rather than just a responsible journalism defence. In the bill Committee, Rob Flello MP (the Labour party’s lead on this issue) proposed a strong public interest defence based around proposals from the Libel Reform Campaign for the government to use. A variant of this defence was adopted by Liberal Demoract Simon Hughes MP at report stage before the Bill went to the Lords. Such a public interest defence has found defenders inside the Conservative party including Rt Hon David Davis MP and Sir Peter Bottomley MP.

This public interest defence, to be inserted in the Bill as a new clause, would protect genuine public interest statements made in good faith. The clause would require that statements that meet a public interest threshold, which cannot be shown to be substantially true (such as claims around scientific research), are promptly clarified or corrected with adequate prominence. Those publications that do not drag their heels in publishing a prominent correction or clarification would be protected from having to defend a libel action. This gives bloggers, NGOs and scientists latitude to publish in a responsible manner on matters of a public interest.

The Libel Reform Campaign is looking to the second reading in the House of Lords for the government to adopt such a public interest defence.

Action on corporations
As pointed out by Index on Censorship, if defamation is about protecting the psychological integrity of individuals, why should corporations be able to sue?

The Libel Reform Campaign is lobbying parliamentarians to adopt a new clause on corporations, preventing them from using the law of defamation to sue individuals and requiring them instead use alternative laws such as malicious falsehood (which has a higher threshold of harm), the Business Protection from Misleading Marketing Regulations 2008 (BPRs), or a freestanding remedy of obtaining a declaration of falsity. The Labour party pursued this point during the Bill Committee, the Liberal Democrats made a manifesto commitment to do this at the last election, and many Conservative parliamentarians have called publicly for a bar on corporations suing individuals (or a higher threshold to initiate such an action). We expect the House of Lords to consider this during the second reading.

Striking out trivial cases
In recent years, the courts have allowed trivial or vexatious cases to proceed at huge expense to both the claimant the defendant, even where there has been little chance of the claimant winning their case. The Ministry of Justice believes that “existing procedures will suffice” under rule 3.4 of the civil procedure rules to strike out such cases at an early stage. But this has clearly not been borne out in legal practice. If the government’s intention is to allow for early strike out, then there must be an amendment telling judges to strike out claims that fail to surmount the “serious” (harm and extent of publication) hurdle.

President Barack Obama signs the SPEECH Act, which protects US citiizens from English libel law

Strengthening protections against “libel tourism”
In 2010, President Obama signed into law the US SPEECH Act protecting Americans from libel judgements made in the high court here. John Whittingdale MP, the chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee described this as a “national humiliation”. The current Bill does help prevent “libel tourism”, the phenomenon where international parties sue in the High Court in London rather than in a more appropriate domestic court.

But while the government’s Clause 9 is an improvement on the current position in law, we believe Subsection 13 (2) of Lord Lester’s Private Members’ Bill would be better, and should be added as an amendment to Clause 9 as it is clearer than the current “libel tourism” clause.

Lord Lester’s clause states:

No harmful event is to be regarded as having occurred in relation to the claimant unless the publication in the jurisdiction can reasonably be regarded as having caused substantial harm to the claimant’s reputation having regard to the extent of publication elsewhere

Internet regulations
This is a weak point of the bill. In recent years, internet intermediaries have received some protection from e-commerce regulations. Under these regulations, hosts do not have to remove material unless they are informed that it is “unlawful”. However, English law has not kept pace with these regulations. Section 1 of the 1996 Defamation Act (written in the internet’s infancy) involves a lower threshold for liability of intermediaries merely when a statement is “defamatory”. Unfortunately, Clause 5 of the current bill uses this out-dated threshold. The Libel Reform Campaign is also urging the government to publish the wider regulations on internet liability immediately. The government is currently intending to amend into the bill through a statutory instrument, giving Parliament a far more limited role in scrutinising these important regulations.

When the Bill is debated in the House of Lords, the Libel Reform Campaign hopes the government will signal its intention to bring forward amendments to the bill in light of the comments and tabled amendments from parliamentarians from all the main political parties. All three parties promised reform. Now is the time to deliver.

Mike Harris is Head of Advocacy at Index on Censorship

Last chance to demand Libel Reform. England’s libel laws are unjust, against the public interest and internationally criticised. Join 60,000 others calling for change. Sign here.

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Prime Minister David Cameron
10 Downing Street
London, UK SW1A 2AA
Fax: +442079250918
cc. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg
Ed Miliband, Leader of the Opposition

RE: Reforming English Libel Law

9 October 2012

Dear Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition,

We the undersigned represent free expression and civil society organisations from across the globe. We welcome the UK government’s attempt to revise English libel law, but remain concerned that the legislation fails to deliver the reform that you promised in your election manifestos and in the May 2010 coalition agreement.

English libel law has been shown to have a chilling effect on free speech around the world. We believe that the Defamation Bill will address this in part by tackling libel tourism, where foreign claimants have brought libel actions to the English courts against defendants who are neither British nor resident in this country. However, the Bill as it stands would not have prevented any of the libel cases that we have seen over the last few years against journalists, scientists, doctors and activists who have spoken out on issues that are in the public interest.

We call on the government to include a strong public interest defence in the Defamation Bill to allow free and open debate in the UK and abroad.

In addition, restrictions must be placed on corporations to limit their ability to use libel law to bully and silence their critics.

The UN Human Rights Committee has warned that unduly restrictive libel law in the UK could have a negative impact on the right to freedom of expression worldwide. We believe it is of the utmost importance that the government delivers reform that protects freedom of speech both in the UK and abroad.

Yours sincerely,

Index on Censorship
Aliansi Jurnalis Independen/Alliance of Independent Journalists
ARTICLE 19
Association of Caribbean Media Workers
Association of Independent Electronic Media
Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies
Canadian Journalists for Free Expression
Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility
Committee to Protect Journalists
Egyptian Organization for Human Rights
Freedom House
Hong Kong Journalists Association
Initiative for Freedom of Expression
International Federation of Journalists
Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance
Media Foundation for West Africa
Media Institute of Southern Africa
MISA Angola
MISA Botswana
MISA Lesotho
MISA Malawi
MISA Mozambique
MISA Namibia
MISA South Africa
MISA Swaziland
MISA Tanzania
MISA Zambia
MISA Zimbabwe
Observatorio Latinoamericano para la Libertad de Expresión – OLA
Pacific Islands News Association
Pakistan Press Foundation
Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms – MADA
Public Association “Journalists”
Reporters Without Borders
South East European Network for the Professionalization of the Media
World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers
World Press Freedom Committee

Albanian Helsinki Committee
Antigua and Barbuda Media Congress
Belarusian Human Rights House
Center for Civil Liberties, Ukraine
Centre for the Development of Democracy and Human Rights, Russia
Center for National and International Studies, Azerbaijan
English PEN
Freedom Files, Russia
Foundation of Regional Initiatives, Ukraine
Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association
Human Rights Club, Azerbaijan
Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly – Vanadzor, Armenia
Human Rights Monitoring Institute, Lithuania
International Partnership for Human Rights, Belgium
Netherlands Helsinki Committee
Norwegian Helsinki Committee
Nota Bene, Tajikistan
Promo LEX Association, Moldova
Public foundation Golos svobody, Kyrgyzstan
Sense About Science
Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union

Last chance to demand Libel Reform. England’s libel laws are unjust, against the public interest and internationally criticised. Join 60,000 others calling for change. Sign here.

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To improve the culture, practice and ethics of the press, we must protect and promote the best of journalism. Alan Rusbridger makes the case for a new settlement

I have always believed that the most interesting period in the phone hacking story was the 18-month period following the Guardian ’s original revelation of the Gordon Taylor settlement — which blew apart News International’s “one rotten apple”  defence in July 2009. It was interesting precisely because almost nothing happened. All the dogs one would expect to bark in such a situation stayed silent. From the politicians, to the police, to the regulator, to the press themselves.

The Leveson Inquiry has finally given us some insight into what was happening in this period. The inquiry has had criticism — some merited, some not. But no one can doubt that Leveson has uncovered uncomfortable truths about the way a number of journalists — as well as politicians and police — have worked in the past. In what other sphere of public life do we think that transparency of this kind is an undesirable thing? I am confident that good things can flow from holding the press up to scrutiny, however difficult it may have been at times.

The press in this country has been under-regulated but over-legislated. There is a risk that by addressing only one side of this equation — by only strengthening regulation — the inquiry will undermine the strength of our press to do the work we all deem so vital. We therefore argued the inquiry should redress the balance between regulation and legislation and make recommendations that meet the twin objectives of protecting the public and protecting press freedom. It is not possible to improve the culture, practice and ethics of the press without protecting and promoting the best of journalism in the public interest.

We believe therefore in a new settlement which will address four deficiencies.

Defamation

The 2011 Global Press Freedom Rankings placed the UK in joint 26th place. Libel law has been cited by many investigative journalists as the main constraint on their work. The current defamation bill makes some improvements but says little, for example, on early dispute resolution. Libel is an essential piece of this jigsaw, especially through an alternative dispute resolution system which we hope Lord Justice Leveson will propose.

Plurality

Another measure of freedom is whether reporters are genuinely free to follow any story they wish — or to what extent proprietorial, editorial or commercial pressures circumscribe, or otherwise influence, the freedom to report on matters of genuine public interest. Without the sort of plurality that enables the Guardian to exist as well as other, much bigger and wealthier titles, it’s doubtful we would have learned about phone hacking. It is understandable that Leveson does not feel able to do a full review of plurality jurisprudence. But anything which concentrates power in the hands of fewer and fewer multi-billionaire proprietors will impoverish our society. The current plurality framework — which apparently granted no one the power to intervene over the BSkyB deal — is plainly insufficient to ensure the kind of plurality that is necessary for a healthy democracy. And this is about more than News Corporation, as anyone following developments in Australian media ownership will testify.

Public interest journalism under threat

While the digital transition brings many benefits — above all, an explosion in free expression that enriches democratic discourse — we must tackle one of its less desirable consequences: a diminution in public interest journalism. Investigative journalism — costly, unpredictable and with no direct revenues attached — is often among the first savings to be made. Other forms of reporting — foreign correspondents, court reporters, specialists — are next. So editors and reporters simply don’t have the freedom to do the reporting that society may want or need. Regulation should therefore enhance the climate for this work, not diminish it. This will include protections for public interest journalism in regulation as well as through consistent application of public interest defences in laws affecting the media.

Regulation

The press must accept that the breach of trust engendered by a series of Editors’ Code breaches and a discredited PCC needs tackling immediately and resolutely. That’s why we have argued for an ambitious system of regulation that includes the use of an alternative dispute resolution system that benefits both complainants and publishers by delivering meaningful redress for breaches of the Editors’ Code, quickly and cheaply. A measure of this strength is essential to prevent the introduction of compulsory or statutory mechanisms to deliver full participation that may undermine press freedom. But it also demonstrates that the press is determined to improve its standards and practices without recourse to judges. So let’s hope that Leveson proposes a balanced package of proposals, in effect a new settlement that both restores trust in journalism and strengthens our role in serving the public interest.

Alan Rusbridger is editor-in chief, Guardian News & Media

Exclusive extracts from our magazine:

The Lawyer | Mark Lewis | Do we need a free press?
The Blogger | Guido Fawkes | Where will this all end?
The Journalist | Trevor Kavanagh | The Leveson effect
Hacked Off | Martin Moore | The danger of power

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After years of campaigning, we have the chance to pass defamation laws that are fit for the 21st century. We cannot miss this opportunity, says Jo Glanville

This piece originally appeared in the Telegraph

On Wednesday, sooner than anyone anticipated, the defamation bill returns to the House of Commons for report stage and its third reading, before heading to the House of Lords for its further progress through Parliament. Along the way, it’s likely to collide with the publication of the Leveson Inquiry’s report. The final shape of the bill and the recommendations of the inquiry will not only have an impact on the press, but on anyone who writes or shares information – on or offline.

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This is another important step in a process that began in 2009, with the launch of the Free Speech Is Not For Sale report by English PEN and Index on Censorship. But the battle is far from over. If we are not vigilant, this chance to transform free expression in England and beyond could be lost.

Index and the Libel Reform Campaign have identified four key points that must be addressed by MPs in their discussions on the Defamation Bill:

The need to provide more protection for internet hosts and intermediaries

A major problem under the current law is that parties who were not responsible for composing, writing, editing or approving allegedly defamatory content may be sued for libel. Facebook, blog platforms or even individual bloggers who allows comments on their website, can be held responsible for allegedly defamatory blog posts, comments or status updates. This encourages private censorship. Powerful interests can threaten internet intermediaries with “takedown notices”, forcing people who are not in a position to judge the nature of the allegedly defamatory material to remove it or face libel actions.

The Bill should ensure that web hosts are only liable if they do not take down undefended words which have been found by a court — even on a cursory examination — to be potentially libellous and not merely alleged to be defamatory. This requires a cheap and fast court method for examining complaints.

The absence of any new or effective public interest defence

Open debate and the search for truth sometimes requires the publication of uncertain or one-sided material, and the law should err on the side of publication, while ensuring that untrue statements are suitably corrected. The public interest defence needs to be clear and simple. We recommend a defence that protects genuine public interest statements made in good faith. The defence should provide that statements that cannot be shown to be true are promptly clarified or corrected with adequate prominence, thus delivering an appropriate remedy to the claimant with no need for the expense of a full trial. Such a defence already exists for some forms of publication, such as the reporting of any public meeting or press conference.

The need for an effective early test to stop trivial cases chilling free speech

The Libel Reform campaign welcomes the “serious harm” test in the Defamation Bill that requires the claimant to show that damage to their reputation is real. The Bill should also set out that enough people in England and Wales have actually viewed the allegedly defamatory material to make it genuinely damaging, and that the claimant has sufficient interest in the UK to justify their claim to have suffered reputational damage here. This would go some way to addressing the problem of “libel tourism”, whereby foreign claimants with few links to the United Kingdom use London’s libel courts to stifle criticism abroad.

How to prevent corporations using the libel law to deter legitimate debate and criticism

Cases such as the British Chiropractic Organisation v Simon Singh show how corporate bodies can attempt to use the current libel law to stifle criticism. We believe that all non-natural persons suing for libel should have to show actual (or likely) financial harm and show malice, dishonesty or reckless disregard for the truth.

We’ll be covering the debate, starting at approximately 2.45pm, on this page. Be sure to keep up to date

15:41  Ken Clarke introducing reading. Says libel laws are not fit for the Internet age.

15:44 Praise for Lord Mawhinney and Lord McNally in their stewarding of the bill.

15:46 Ian Paisley Jr asks if test of “serious harm” test could discourage wronged people from seeking justice. Clarke says he will address concerns.

15:54 David Lammy points out that “serious harm” means different things in different context. Clarke agrees, saying this is why it’s up to the court to decide what serious harm is.

15:57 Clarke says Reynolds defence will be retained, but should not be seen as set of hurdles. In other defence news, qualified privilege will be extended to scientific journals.

16:12 Of course, when Ken Clarke was talking about Saudis suing, he didn’t have anyone specific in mind. Now we’re on to tricky part: Clause 5, which has had all the coverage re trolls today. Read it here. Julian Huppert seeks assurance that steps outlined (in the identification of anonymous posters) would be voluntary. Echoing what Index told the Guardian earlier.

16:18 David Davis asks at what point a jury trial in libel would be triggered – the bill stipulates that assumption should be against jury trial for libel. Clarke says it’s discretionary. Says extremely technical cases, say on science, would be unsuitable for jury trial. Cutting of jury trials one simple way of cutting costs. Clarke finishes up saying the bill means free speech will not be unduly impeded, and public debate defended. He’s clearly very pleased with the consultative process that brought the bill about. Reminds house of cross-party support.

16: 23 Labour’s Sadiq Khan pays tribute to Libel Reform Campaign (that’s us!) for work and dedication on issue. Peter Bottomley mentions Simon Singh and Peter Wilmshurst.

16:31 Sadiq Khan says clause 5  applies to defamation only – not trolling.

16:34 Paisley Jr on feet again. Raises issue of trolling, which, as Khan has just pointed out, is not the issue here. Ken Clarke points out that Section 127 of the Communications Act (which, as Paul Chambers knows, has its problems) covers bullying, harassment etc.

16:50 Paul Farrelly points out danger of “piecemeal” reform, where the house imagine that some issues will be addressed elsewhere, such as at the Leveson Inquiry.

16:52 Khan says Labour keen to grasp opportunity for real reform.

16:58 Steve Rotheram refers to “professional trollers” attending “troll academy”. This has been somewhat sidetracked by Nadine Dorries and others. Suicide pacts?

17:59 Buckland says now is the time for Parliament to take the lead on codifying law on privacy in addition to codifying law on defamation.

18:00 Neal Carmichael mentions need to protect freedom of speech.

18:05 Buckland says this bill addresses well the nuances and range of context within which libel and defamation action can be brought.

18:08 Buckland now moving on to public interest defence in Clause 4 of the bill. Says he understands reluctance to seek to define public interest in law, evolves from year to year and case to case.

18:08 Buckland says the term should be defined according to particular case in which it is invoked.

18:13 David Lammy says that the job is not yet done in spite of bill.

18:15 Lammy adds it is right to codify this area of law now for benefit of ordinary citizens. Important to underline freedom of expression, he says, but also right to say we are living in age where our liberalisms need to be fully scrutinised.

18:18 Lammy says we need to ensure “serious harm test” is not so high as to stop ordinary person from accessing justice.

18:20 Lammy says the “gaping hole” in the bill is the situation in relation to corporation and companies. Notes the excessive power that they have had in “terrorising” publications who have got beneath the truth of what has gone on in such companies.

18:28 Lammy says he is concerned about the effects of Facebook bullying on young people and adults, comments more visible. The area merits hard discussion, he adds.

18:33 Stephen Phillips says no-one can doubt the importance of the right of free speech, but other rights also need to be addressed. The right to a true reputation is one that is particularly important to well-being, as is the right to privacy, and the right to speedy and efficient redress is also key.

18:40 Phillips says the costs associated with defamation proceedings are prohibitive and inimical to free speech. Phillips adds that the protection of reputation should not be purchased at the expense of what ought to be in the public domain.

18:46 Buckland suggests the joint committee launch a post-legislative scrutiny into the bill, as it has done with the Freedom of Information Act.

18:48 Phillips urges caution, says ambitious legislation can often have unintended consequences, adding that incremental change has been the hallmark of good legislation in this area and others.

Sadiq Khan has tweeted a link to his speech on the second reading:

My speech on Second Reading of Defamation Bill (without the many interventions) can be found here: bit.ly/MA02Ey #libelreform

— Sadiq Khan MP (@SadiqKhan) June 12, 2012

18:55 Paul Farrelly giving his speech now. Says codifying law must go beyond offering certainty, stresses need for greater reform, such as by reducing the chilling effect of our libel laws.

19:03 Farrelly says there is a need to reform London’s reputation as a city called sue.

Simon Singh has tweeted:

Paul Farrelly one of several MPs bringing sense to the defamation bill debate as it enters its 4th hour.

— Simon Singh (@SLSingh) June 12, 2012

19:07 Farrelly says without conditional fee agreements (CFAs), the McCanns and members of the science community such as Peter Wilmshurst would have been unable to defend themselves.

19:10 Farrelly stresses the need to strike out trivial and vexatious claims, such as that brought against Hardeep Singh, in order to reduce the amount of libel tourism that takes place in London. Farrelly suggests libel reform would be a suitable wedding present for Singh.

19:13 Farrelly discusses the Reynolds defence, says it was a defence of last resort for journalists, there to be used when papers had made an honest mistake.

19:20 Tom Brake says it is embarrassing that foreign nationals can bring cases to our courts on weak pretexts. Says we should instead be seeking to achieve an international blueprint of our laws. Adds that there is a need to future-proof the legislation, issues of context, content and intent should be technology-independent.

19:24 Brake name-checks the Libel Reform campaign on pushing hard on the issue of reforming the law. He cites areas of improvement as the public interest defence, serious harm test, the role played by corporations and a protection for internet hosts.

19:28 Brake goes into detail about what is in our briefing, which you can read below. He says good progress has been made on the bill, and that we should not pass by our once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to improve the bill.

19:31 Amber Rudd says there is a fine balance between weighing up the right to free expression and the right to privacy, adding that our current libel laws are outdated. She cites libel tourism as “hardly an attractive label” to be attached to the country.

19:38 Julian Huppert rises to speak. He says the current position is “simply not acceptable”, citing the imbalance in access to justice and the chilling effect felt by websites such as Mumsnet and science writers who fear libel action being brought against them.

19:42 Huppert pays tribute to the Libel Reform campaign, name-checking Index and our former CEO John Kampfner, English PEN and campaigner Dr Evan Harris.

19:45 There has been an “insidious silencing of rigorous academic debate” among journals due to a fear of libel action, Huppert says. He says one in 10 of all high court libel cases have involved an academic.

19:48 Huppert says one area that has not been looked into enough is costs. Adds that the government needs to clarify how costs will be reduced in the legislative changes being made. He reiterates Brake’s point that there is a difference between the rights of corporations and individuals, and that they should be treated differently.

19:52 Index is wrapping up the live blog for this evening. Many thanks for following, and you can read the Libel Reform Campaign’s briefing on the bill below:

Briefing for Second Reading Debate of Defamation Bill 2012

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