Court of Appeal has stated that the rights of children should outweigh nearly all cases of public interest

by Alex Wright - Legal Associate

03 April 2011, filed under Consumer

The Court of Appeal has stated that the public interest in a celebritys affair is far less important than the safety and wellbeing of the children belonging to the famous person in question.

The News of the World has discovered that the alleged woman who is involved in the affair, who also happens to be married, has worked with the well known celebrity and had decided to end her employment within her job an estimated year after the affair was reported to have finished. The court has stated that the News of the World wanted it printed that the real reason why she walked out on her job was because of her involvement in the affair, and the scandal which eventually followed.

The news of the World had intended to print all the details of the alleged affair in March, until the famous individual in question requested a High Court order to put a ban on revealing their identity and that of his mistress, as well as the details of their affair, the court stated.

The judge who had heard the trial on a Saturday in private, decided to dismiss the celebrities request and their right to appeal the decision, but stopped the News of the World from printing the story the following day and gave permission for a court hearing on the right to appeal.

Lord Justices Ward, Laws and Moore-Bick all came to the conclusion in that hearing that the High Court judge had not been correct and then gave permission for the appeal to go ahead. Ensuring the anonymity of the male celebrity and his mistress, who both work within the industry for entertainment, was important, as letting the public know their names would without a doubt affect the teenage children of the celebrity, the judges had stated.

The judges did however, agree with the decision of the High Court judges opinion that freedom of expression was far more important than the right of privacy for the male celebrity, but disagreed strongly with the judge’s ruling on how the rights of the children would adversely affect the balance of the rights.
 
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