Loreena McKennitt

The growing law of privacy received a major boost from the Court of Appeal today when three senior judges dismissed an appeal against an injunction blocking publication of a book about the Canadian folk singer and composer Loreena McKennitt, written by a former friend and employee, Niema Ash.
The judgment threatens the future of tabloid “kiss and tell” stories.
Lord Justices Buxton, Latham and Longmore said Mr Justice Eady, who granted the injunction a year ago, had made “no error of principle” in balancing Miss McKennitt’s right to respect for her private life under Article 8 of the Human Rights Convention against Miss Ash’s right to freedom of expression under Article 10.
The Court of Appeal upheld an injunction preventing Miss Ash from publishing specified passages in the book, Travels with Loreena McKennitt: My Life as a Friend. They included, for example, references to Miss McKennitt’s state of health following a bereavement; “household minutiae” about her Irish cottage; and “something which happened in a bedroom in a hotel in Hawaii, which Ms Ash was sharing with Ms McKennitt and her mother. It happened when Ms McKennitt was aroused from sleep after going to bed exhausted”.
However, Miss Ash was permitted to report “passing references to friendships with various men”; the “general background” to the death of Miss McKennitt’s fiancé in 1998, as opposed to her emotional reaction to bereavement; and the fact that from time to time she had gone busking in London.
Afterwards, Miss McKennitt said the ruling vindicated her stance but Miss Ash said the judgment would have a “devastating effect” on biographers.

Posted at December 14, 2006 04:00 PM