Media lawyers will need to be experts in defamation and privacy laws across the globe under European proposals, a panel of prominent in-house lawyers in the media industry has warned.

Lawyers for The Times, the BBC, the Periodical Publishers Association (PPA) and the Newspaper Society told a House of Lords European Union select committee earlier this month that an EU proposal on the law applicable to non-contractual obligations - the Rome II convention - would dramatically increase the cost of defamation litigation.

Under current defamation law, English courts can apply the law of a jurisdiction where harm occurred - but will only award damages if there would also have been a cause of action under domestic law.

The proposed regulation will scrap this proviso, leading potentially to far more actions being brought in the UK under foreign laws.

Clare Hoban, head of public and legal affairs at the PPA and a member of the media panel objecting to the proposals, said: 'If this legislation goes through, media lawyers will need knowledge of laws all over the world.

'Media lawyers don't tend to be international and so it will be a case of either using foreign lawyers, or giving advice which they are not wholly comfortable with.

'Judges will need to use more experts, which will have a big impact on trial costs.'

She was joined before the committee by Alastair Brett, legal manager at The Times, Glenn Del Medico, head of programme legal advice at the BBC, and Santha Rasaiah, political editorial and regulatory affairs director at the Newspaper Society.

Jeremy Clarke-Williams, head of litigation at City firm Russell Jones & Walker and a member of the Law Society's defamation reference group, commented: 'There are relatively few designated libel judges, and sometimes English law has to be explained to them.

If the intention was to reduce litigation or make it easier, then [the proposals] won't fulfil that purpose.'

Rachel Rothwell