Nicholas Dobson tramples on outdated concepts of qualified privilege & proportionality
The 10th August 2005 was not to be a good day for either Slough Borough Council or a visitor to one of its managed public gardens. For Ms Jane Clift, the visitor in question, on seeing a small child trampling through a flowerbed, uprooting plants and plucking the heads off flowers, protested to the child’s mother. However, the mother’s companion, who had been drinking, reacted badly, becoming extremely abusive and threatening. This led Ms Clift next day to speak on the telephone to Ms Fozia Rashid, the council’s anti-social behaviour co-ordinator. Unfortunately, however, as Ward LJ pointed out in the Court of Appeal on 21 December 2010, that conversation “went horribly badly” (Jane Clift v Slough Borough Council [2010] EWCA Civ 1484, [2010] All ER (D) 243 (Dec)). As a consequence, Ms Clift was notified to various council employees and council contacts as falling foul of the council’s “Violence at Work Policy”.
Ms Clift had become angry about her call to Ms Rashid (which ended with Ms Clift having
