Fairly privileged

Local authority inquiry reports should receive qualified privilege so long as the inquiry and report are fair, the Law Commission has provisionally proposed.

The commission made the suggestion in a consultation on whether the law gets in the way of publishing inquiry reports.

Fear of breaching liability insurance cover and possible libel actions are inhibiting publication, it said, while also asking whether local authorities should have new legal powers to set up formal inquiries, whose reports would be immune from defamation actions.

While it only considered local authority reports, it said the underlying principles should apply to any public bodies which instigate non-statutory inquiries.