How the rich and powerful try to intimidate the press
The Story
The Times
3.9 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 25 January 2023
⏱️ 34 minutes
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Summary
Until recently the term Slapp – strategic lawsuit against public participation – meant very little. But yesterday in parliament, an MP introduced a bill to ban what he called "legal gangsterism" – attempts by the rich and powerful to use the legal system to stifle journalistic investigations. The Times and Sunday Times' editorial legal director Pia Sarma argues it's time to restore the balance between rich claimants and journalists pursuing the truth.
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Guest: Pia Sarma, Editorial Legal Director, Times Media.
Host: Manveen Rana.
Clips: Times Radio, France 24, Parliament TV.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | It was one of those perfect picturesque days last July. |
| 0:07.7 | The tax lawyer Dan Needle had just been out watching his kids swimming in a local lake |
| 0:13.5 | in Norfolk when he came home to find an alarming email. |
| 0:20.3 | It was from Nadine Zahawi's Lawyers. |
| 0:26.2 | At the time, Zahawi was the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Dan had just published a blog |
| 0:33.4 | asking questions about his tax affairs. |
| 0:37.0 | Had Zahawi, a multi-millionaire businessman and the Chancellor failed to pay millions of |
| 0:44.6 | pounds in tax. |
| 0:50.2 | It looks like he just didn't pay tax that was due. |
| 0:54.8 | Mr Zahawi threatened to sue me for reporting on this and making claims about it that he |
| 1:00.8 | didn't like. |
| 1:05.9 | He demanded I would trap my claims, said if I didn't, I'd receive an open letter, which |
| 1:10.1 | is lawyer code for I'll sue you, and said I wasn't even allowed to mention the fact |
| 1:14.8 | he'd sent me that communication. |
| 1:19.1 | I had to sit down with my wife and discuss whether we were ready to proceed on a path |
| 1:23.2 | which if all went wrong, could end up with £2 million of court awards and costs £2 million. |
| 1:32.5 | We decided to go ahead. |
| 1:35.0 | Dan kept publishing. |
| 1:38.1 | The details he uncovered started to appear in the Sunday Times too. |
| 1:43.6 | And it turns out now that at the same time, around the same time, he was sending those legal |
| 1:48.2 | threats to me. |
| 1:49.2 | He knew there was something wrong with this tax affairs. |
... |
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