Sir Simon Hughes and Others v Associated Newspapers Limited

Today, Mr Justice Nicklin handed down a detailed judgment in respect of the applications made by Associated in relation to limitation and restrictions orders.

The judgment is available here.

Please see below a statement on behalf of Baroness Doreen Lawrence of Clarendon OBE; Sir Elton John and David Furnish; Elizabeth Hurley; Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex; Sadie Frost; and Sir Simon Hughes:

“We are delighted with today’s decision which allows our claims over serious criminal activity and gross breaches of privacy by the Mail titles to proceed to trial.

The High Court has dismissed “without difficulty” the attempt by Associated Newspapers (publisher of The Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday and the Mail Online) to throw these cases out. Indeed, the Judge found that each of our claims had  a real prospect of showing there was concealment of unlawful acts by the Mail titles and that this could not have been discovered until recently. Our claims can now proceed to trial.

As we have maintained since the outset, we bring our claims over the deplorable and illegal activities which took place over many years, including private investigators being hired to place secretly listening devices inside our cars and homes, the tapping of our phone calls, corrupt payments to police for inside information, and the illegal accessing of our medical information from hospitals and financial information from banks. We intend to uncover the truth at trial and hold those responsible at Associated Newspapers fully accountable.

The Judge also found ledgers showing secret payments by The Mail and The Mail on Sunday to private investigators which had been provided to our lawyers could not be used at this stage without the consent of the newspapers or the Government. This only delays the inevitable since they will have to be produced in the course of the claim by Associated in any event. However, if The Mail and The Mail on Sunday have nothing to hide, and they genuinely believe our allegations are unfounded, as they appear to claim, they should provide us with the ledgers voluntarily now, and let the claims proceed to trial as quickly as possible.”

Baroness Doreen Lawrence of Clarendon OBE, Elizabeth Hurley and Sir Elton John and David Furnish are represented by gunnercooke.

Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex, and Sadie Frost are represented by Hamlins LLP.

Sir Simon Hughes is represented by Thomson Heath & Associates.

David Sherborne, Julian Santos, Ben Hamer and Luke Browne of 5RB are Counsel for all the Claimants instructed by Callum Galbraith of Hamlins LLP, Anjlee Sangani of gunnercooke and Mark Thomson of Thomson Heath & Associates.

All queries to media.comms@hamlins.com