Defamation Act 1996 (c. 31)

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Defamation Act 1996

1996 CHAPTER 31

ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS

Go to Preamble

  1. Responsibility for publication

    1. 1. Responsibility for publication.

  2. Offer to make amends

    1. 2. Offer to make amends.

    2. 3. Accepting an offer to make amends.

    3. 4. Failure to accept offer to make amends.

  3. Limitation

    1. 5. Limitation of actions: England and Wales.

    2. 6. Limitation of actions: Northern Ireland.

  4. The meaning of a statement

    1. 7. Ruling on the meaning of a statement.

  5. Summary disposal of claim

    1. 8. Summary disposal of claim.

    2. 9. Meaning of summary relief.

    3. 10. Summary disposal: rules of court.

    4. 11. Summary disposal: application to Northern Ireland.

  6. Evidence of convictions

    1. 12. Evidence of convictions.

  7. Evidence concerning proceedings in Parliament

    1. 13. Evidence concerning proceedings in Parliament.

  8. Statutory privilege

    1. 14. Reports of court proceedings absolutely privileged.

    2. 15. Reports, &c. protected by qualified privilege.

  9. Supplementary provisions

    1. 16. Repeals.

    2. 17. Interpretation.

  10. General provisions

    1. 18. Extent.

    2. 19. Commencement.

    3. 20. Short title and saving.

  11. Schedules:

    1. Schedule 1

      Qualified privilege.

      1. Part I

        Statements having qualified privilege without explanation or contradiction.

      2. Part II

        Statements privileged subject to explanation or contradiction.

      3. Part III

        Supplementary provisions.

    2. Schedule 2

      Repeals.

An Act to amend the law of defamation and to amend the law of limitation with respect to actions for defamation or malicious falsehood.

[4th July 1996]

Be it enacted by the Queen´s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:–

Responsibility for publication

1 Responsibility for publication

(1) In defamation proceedings a person has a defence if he shows that–

(a) he was not the author, editor or publisher of the statement complained of,

(b) he took reasonable care in relation to its publication, and

(c) he did not know, and had no reason to believe, that what he did caused or contributed to the publication of a defamatory statement.

(2) For this purpose "author", "editor" and "publisher" have the following meanings, which are further explained in subsection (3)–

  • "author" means the originator of the statement, but does not include a person who did not intend that his statement be published at all;

  • "editor" means a person having editorial or equivalent responsibility for the content of the statement or the decision to publish it; and

  • "publisher" means a commercial publisher, that is, a person whose business is issuing material to the public, or a section of the public, who issues material containing the statement in the course of that business.

(3) A person shall not be considered the author, editor or publisher of a statement if he is only involved–

(a) in printing, producing, distributing or selling printed material containing the statement;

(b) in processing, making copies of, distributing, exhibiting or selling a film or sound recording (as defined in Part I of the [1988 c. 48.] Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988) containing the statement;

(c) in processing, making copies of, distributing or selling any electronic medium in or on which the statement is recorded,…

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Sourced from the Federal Register of Legislation at 26 August 2026. For the latest information on Australian Government law please go to https://www.legislation.gov.au.