Wednesday 14 October 2009

Twitter versus the Injunction - A Lawyer's 'Take'

"It is indeed a sorry state of affairs when the due process of law is confounded, not by government, but by the forces of populism and the shallow and capricious phenomenon that we call the internet. That the users of a social networking site like 'Twitter' defeated an established legal firm seeking to protect the reputation of its esteemed client, is indeed troubling.

It is apparent to many not just in my own profession, but in the business community and in certain areas of government that the 'world wide web' is behaving like the 'wild west': It has become barbarous. Long established laws, principles and ethics are being casually disregarded. Procedure, convention, practice in the orderly, responsible dissemination of information are being trampled underfoot by gossip, speculation and chatter. The execution of appropriate legal undertakings are being undermined by frivolous and unbalanced opinion.

When an established law firm went to court this week to obtain an injunction it followed due legal process. It did so to protect its respected client from the kind of tittle tattle that is rife on the internet and that can destroy the reputation of a company as well as the livelihoods of its employees. That an august institution as the Law can easily be undermined should give us pause for thought. Who will defend you or me when our reputations have been thus maligned?

Do we really want an internet that is wild and capricious, that has no rules nor boundaries? What if, say, we lived in a world where anyone, yes anyone, had access to the law, whatever their intent, whatever their status, and despite their inability to 'put their money where their mouth is'? Well then Law would become a mockery, a free-for-all where any man could take issue with any other - however nefarious, or shallow, or ill-informed his intent might be. The courts would be overrun and would no longer have the capacity to defend those who generate wealth, those who keep our society ticking along - those who make society what it is.

Surely we do not want all men and women to have free and unbridled access to the internet any more than we would want them to have free and unbridled access to the law? For that, we surely understand, must lead to the breakdown of everything that this society stands for, the trampling under foot of everything that is dear to us."
(Lawyers name and firm withheld)
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26 comments:

  1. Maybe they should charge the lawyers with contempt of parliament... contempt of the people?

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  2. Lawyers have the right to represent people, people have the right to be represented.
    Whassa problem?

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  3. MikeHill, are you suggesting lawyers should take liability for their clients' actions?

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  4. We should just remember, Trafigura were entitled to keep this whole thing secret under English law. If you don't like that you should blame the law not the lawyers.

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  5. Wasn't this story available in Hansard?

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  6. Just imagine if no-win, no-fee meant that ghastly poor people had access to the law.
    I wonder what Carter-Ruck's policy is on no-win-no-fee?

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  7. Maybe the papers should have 'published and be damned'. Some people don't think that the case was watertight in the first place.
    Were that true and it had gone to court, a legal precedent might have been set

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  8. It is alleged elsewhere on the web that the compensation Trafigura have agreed to pay out is far less than the amount they have spent on staff bonuses for those who did the deed, and legal fees for those hushing it up.
    So Justice has not been done quite yet.

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  9. Does anyone know the name of the useless Judge who granted the injunction in the first place?

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  10. This comes at a good time for Parliament. All of a sudden everyone is saying, 'take your hands off our parliamentary privilege!'

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  11. Funnily enough, many Laws in this land were designed to protect the weak, but ended up being used by the rich.
    That's the problem: anyone can have access to the Law

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  12. SteveJames - There are a lot of people who are working for that to happen with the internet.

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  13. The lawyers did everyone a favour. The info was accessible on the internet all along, but thanks to the lawyers, everyone learnt where to find it.
    And who says that there's no such thing as bad publicity?

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  14. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  15. Oh dear.

    Legal type doesn't like the internet. Naughty internet, mustn't have non legal types using it, ban it!

    F*** off twat!

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  16. How do you get that light font? Always wondered...

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  17. Dear Mr. Ludd, he's right you know. The internet belongs to everyone.

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  18. Am I right in thinking that 'Man in the Street' doesn't get the joke?

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  19. No, he doesn't get the fact that it is actually a joke.

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  20. There are too many people who take this blogging thing far too seriously

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  21. Are we not spending too much time on all of this?
    Let us not forget that it isn't the lawyers who are responsible. It is those who draft the laws!

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  22. I fear a lot of people don't see the funny side of the case for!

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  23. 'tittle tattle'? What, the prevention of the discussion of a report from,er, an esteemed firm of lawyers, which said that the actions of an 'esteemed company' broke EU directives?
    How tittle-tattle of them.

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  24. 'Defence' Lawyer15 October 2009 at 10:42

    Of course it's tittle tattle. None of the Tweeters had any knowledge of the story. They were just picking up on what someone else had blogged / micro-blogged.

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  25. Golly, I still think that everyone is taking this really, really seriously

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