Law digests: 4 February 2022

Defamation

Bashar v Thompson and another [2022] EWHC 25 (QB), All ER (D) 23 (Jan)

The Queen’s Bench Division ruled on preliminary issues which arose on the claimant father’s claim that the first defendant, a social worker employed by the second defendant council, had made two defamatory statements in a Family Assessment Report written in relation to a child (A) from his former partner’s previous relationship, following the claimant’s application for a child arrangements order to allow his son (N) to live with him rather than the former partner. The first defendant had stated that she had ‘serious concerns to his extreme views’ and ‘serious concerns to his value base and views’ which in her view were ‘extreme’. While the court rejected the claimant’s submission that the above statements had been tantamount to saying he was an ‘extremist’, which in turn could have been equated to ‘terrorist’ or ‘jihadist’, both statements were Chase level one and defamatory. The reasonable reader would not necessarily infer from the statements that the claimant had been prepared