Plans to clamp down on internet libel and libel tourism will be unveiled by ministers today.

Newspapers at present face the prospect of endless libel suits which can be lodged every time an article is downloaded, even many years after the event. Editors and lawyers have warned that the rise in actions has a chilling effect on free speech.

Ministers are also concerned about libel tourism, with many litigants choosing to come to London - now the “libel capital of the Western world” - to bring libel actions that have little to do with its jurisdiction.

Internet libel and the permanence of articles on the web is spawning a whole new defamation industry against newspapers and other publishers of electronic material.

The proposed reforms, contained in a consultation paper to be published by Bridget Prentice, Minister of Justice, are expected to propose the introduction of time limits to stop the possibility of people launching libel suits many years after an article was originally published. At the same time, ministers will suggest reforms to stop articles being open to a libel action each time they are downloaded.

Normally people must lodge libel actions within a year. But with the internet, each fresh download triggers a new one-year time limit.

One option is to give articles that have been online for more than a year an automatic archive defence of qualified privilege. If no law suit was lodged in the first year after hard copy publication, a libel action could only be brought later if the newspaper had been negligent or refused to publish a suitable retraction or correction.

Earlier this year, the European Court of Human Rights dismissed a test challenge brought by Times Newspapers over internet libel. But the judges also said that the cases indicated the need for time restraints.

They said: “While an aggrieved applicant must be afforded a real opportunity to vindicate his right to reputation, libel proceedings brought against a newspaper after a significant lapse of time may well, in the absence of exceptional circumstances, give rise to a disproportionate interference with press freedom under article 10.”

The Times argued that the present law, enabling a new libel suit to be lodged every time an article is downloaded, even years later, was “an unjustifiable and disproportionate restriction on its right to freedom of expression”.

The test challenge arose over two articles about the Russian-born businessman, Grigori Loutchansky and his financial dealings.Each article was posed on the newspaper’s website on the day it was published in print.

In December 1999 Mr Loutchansky brought libel proceedings over the two articles. The newspaper accepted they were defamatory but relied on the defence of qualified privilege, arguing that they were of such a kind and seriousness that they had a duty to publish, and the public a right to know.

While the proceedings were ongoing, the articles remained on the newspaper’s website and in December 2000 Mr Loutchanksy lodged fresh libel proceedings over the internet publication.

Mr Loutchansky won his action but the newspaper appealed the High Court ruling over “single publication,” arguing that articles are only actionable when first posted on the internet.

At the heart of the issue is a Victorian case dating back to 1849, involving the Duke of Brunswick, which said that each publication is a new publication.

The exiled Duke heard in 1848 that he had been defamed in a London newspaper, the Weekly Dispatch, 18 years earlier in 1830. Because the six-year limitation period that then existed for bringing libel suits had long since expired, he sent out a manservant to find him a copy of the newspaper.

The manservant duly found one at the British Museum. Armed with a copy of the original article, the Duke sued for libel and was awarded damages of £500, now nearer £50,000.

In the internet age, that means each hit on a website, Times Newspapers argued, enabling people to sue for libel well beyond the usual one-year limitation period.

Mark Stephens, head of media at Finers Stephens Innocent, said: “Ministers will also want to restrain libel tourism cases - by trying to insist there is a tighter threshold on bringing defamations here.

“Why should the taxpayer pay the costs of running a court for a Ukranian businessman to sue a Ukraine language website that virtually no-one has heard of?”

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