Award

Gould v Evolve Media (IMPRESS scheme)

IMPRESS · Press · England and Wales · May 2018

Why it matters

Shows the scheme delivering a remedy a claimant often wants more than money: a forced public apology and retraction on the same platforms that carried the article, alongside modest damages.

Summary

This is a press-arbitration decision under the IMPRESS scheme, Jonny Gould (Claimant) v Evolve Media Limited (Respondent), dated May 2018. The scheme offers a low-cost alternative to a libel action in the High Court, letting a complaint against a regulated publisher be decided by an arbitrator appointed through CIArb. The full award, with its findings and any remedy, is set out in the original, linked here.

The detail

Parties: Jonny Gould (Claimant) v Evolve Media Limited (Respondent)

Case number: IMPRESS Arbitration Scheme Case No. 132130205

Outcome: Defamation upheld: £900 damages plus a full published apology and retraction on the website and Twitter.

Quantum: £900

Applicable law: Arbitration Act 1996; English defamation law; the CIArb/IMPRESS arbitration scheme rules.

Issues in play: An individual's reputation against a publisher's article, with the remedy weighed for proportionality, again through the IMPRESS scheme rather than the courts.

Read the full decision at IMPRESS ↗

Locus Standi links to the source decision and publishes its own plain-language summary. It does not reproduce the text of the award.

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