Steven Joyce defamation case: Appeal Court finds NBR did not defame former National MP

Friday, 9 October 2020

Former National minister Steven Joyce successfully sued for defamation after NBR published a column critical of his time in government. The Court of Appeal has now overturned the earlier High Court decision. (File photo)

The publisher of the National Business Review has succeeded in its challenge against a decision that it defamed former National Party cabinet minister Steven Joyce.

Joyce successfully sued NBR after it published a column by right-wing commentator Matthew Hooton saying it would be a shame if then-National leader Simon Bridges was to bow to “blackmail” by Joyce .

Columnist Matthew Hooton stopped writing for NBR after the article was published. He later apologised to Joyce.

In June 2020, the High Court at Auckland ordered NBR to pay Joyce nearly $270,000 in costs.

NBR publisher Fourth Estate Holdings Ltd and director and shareholder Todd Scott challenged the finding, and the costs awarded, in the Court of Appeal in Wellington in September 2020.

* Steven Joyce awarded $269,000 in costs after suing NBR

Steven Joyce makes his validictory speech in Parliament after retiring in 2018.

* NBR publishers defamed Steven Joyce, High Court rules

* Steven Joyce takes defamation over Hooton column to High Court

In a judgment released on Friday, Court of Appeal judges Justice Forrie Miller, Justice David Goddard and Justice Brendan Brown said the meaning of the passages of the article with which Joyce took issue were not in fact defamatory.

The article at the centre of the case, written in March 2018, was highly critical of Joyce’s time in Government.

The Court of Appeal heard the case in September 2020.

It alleged Joyce used fellow ex-National minister Amy Adams as a “proxy” and favoured telco Chorus in his political dealings.

Giving evidence at the High Court in December 2019, Joyce said: “I have never blackmailed anyone whether to achieve my political objectives or otherwise. I consider that Mr Hooton's statements about blackmail have absolutely no basis in fact”.

Hooton later issued an apology as part of a legal settlement with Joyce. But NBR and its publisher Fourth Estate Holdings Ltd continued to defend against defamation claims from Joyce.

After the opinion piece was published, Scott wrote multiple tweets about it, saying its sources were 'solid' and he intended to subpoena five people 'from the shadow cabinet' that would back up Hooton's statements.

In his decision, High Court Justice Pheroze Jagose said the article and tweets implied Joyce was prepared to engage in unethical and improper conduct to pursue his and his party’s political objectives.

But the statements about blackmail and using Adams as a proxy were untrue and therefore, defamatory, Jagose said.

A lawyer for Fourth Estate and Scott, Ali Romanos, said in the Court of Appeal that Hooton’s column had used hyperbole and an ordinary reader would not have taken it literally, Romanos said.

The Court of Appeal agreed with Romanos.

In their judgment, Justices Miller, Goddard and Brown said Hooton had a reputation for being provocative.

“A reasonable reader of the article’s exaggerated and colourful prose would understand that it was, as Fourth Estate pleaded, intended to be an entertaining ‘hit’.

“There is nothing improper in the conduct that this passage, properly understood, alleges. It might perhaps be described as petulant,” the judges said.

The Court of Appeal upheld the appeal against the decision and costs.

The court ordered Joyce to pay Fourth Estate Holdings Ltd and Scott’s legal costs.