Arron Banks loses libel lawsuit against investigative journalist

Arron Banks, the millionaire businessman, has lost a high-profile libel lawsuit against an investigative journalist who claimed that the backer of Brexit “lied” about his “covert relationship” and links with the Russian government.

The High Court in London on Monday dismissed the case brought by Banks against journalist Carole Cadwalladr over a statement she made in a TED talk in April 2019 in which she referred to Banks’ links with Russia, along with a related tweet.

The landmark ruling will be closely watched by media organisations because it is a big test of the statutory defence of public interest contained in the 2013 Defamation Act.

Banks, founder of the Leave.EU campaign that is credited with helping to win the 2016 Brexit referendum, brought the libel action, claiming Cadwalladr had “crossed the line” over the comments, which he claimed were “false and defamatory”.

Cadwalladr, who has won awards for her reporting on the influence of big data and social media on elections, defended the lawsuit by relying on the statutory defence of public interest contained in section 4 of the 2013 act.

Under the act, the defendant must show that the statement was on a matter of public interest and that they reasonably believed that publishing it was in the public interest.

Gavin Millar QC, representing Cadwalladr, told the High Court that the lawsuit was important for anyone who had concerns about freedom of speech. She was “legally entitled” to say what she did “as part of discussion of matters in the public interest”, he said.

On Monday, Mrs Justice Karen Steyn dismissed Banks’ claim and ruled that Cadwalladr had established a public interest defence from the date of her TED talk until April 29 2020, when the defence fell away because “there was a significant change of circumstances”. 

On that date the Electoral Commission published a statement into its investigation on the funding of electoral campaigns, saying that it accepted findings by the National Crime Agency there was no evidence Banks had committed any wrongdoing.

The judge ruled that after April 29 2020, Banks had failed to prove that the TED talk was likely to cause serious harm to his reputation and also found that the tweet had not caused serious harm.

Banks brought the libel lawsuit personally against Cadwalladr who crowdfunded her legal fees to help pay for her defence amid concerns that if she lost the lawsuit she could be on the hook to cover Banks’ huge legal costs.

On Monday, Cadwalladr said on Twitter that she was “so profoundly grateful and relieved” and thanked her “stellar legal team” and the 29,000 people who crowdfunded her defence.

Arron Banks said in a tweet: “Congratulations to Carole on winning today, it leaves open for the journalist the excuse that she thought what she said was correct even though she had no facts.

“There are important points of law at stake here & we will probably appeal.” He added: “I won the only thing that mattered Brexit !”

Although Cadwalladr initially defended the claim on the basis of truth, limitation and the public interest, the defences of truth and limitation were withdrawn after an earlier court ruling in 2019 on the meaning of the words which the judge had found the TED talk and the tweet to bear. She continued to defend the case on public interest grounds.