UPDATE: See also Going Clear: the film Scientologists don’t want you to see.
2013 LIBEL REFORMS UNDONE BY NOT APPLYING IN NORTHERN IRELAND?
IN A NUTSHELL: The Church of Scientology has successfully used libel law, reformed in England, Scotland and Wales but not Northern Ireland, to intimidate Sky, who opted to abandon a broadcast of a film critical of the 'church' rather than face expensive legal proceedings. They don't have the technical ability to separate the signal to ensure the film wouldn't be broadcast in Northern Ireland, so the 2013 libel reforms, designed to stop 'libel tourism' and abuses of super-injunctions by the likes of Trafigura, seem to have been rendered null.Another good example of why we need to look beyond the formal regulators to laws as well.
Notes after reading TV ‘exposure’ of Scientology halted by UK libel law split.
In its goal of preventing a broadcast of Going Clear in the UK, the church has an unlikely ally in Northern Ireland’s libel laws. The 2013 Defamation Act set out a new defence for public-interest journalism on the British mainland: that the plaintiff has to show “serious harm” has been done to it.
