Regarding the MP arrest, the legal requirement to maintain anonymity of a complainant is not normally a reason not to identify an arrested person. The media know well how to report such matters.
A few points on this as there is a load of conspiracy bobbins appearing about this on here. Firstly, the MPs name is not the subject of a D-Notice, or DSMA Notice, as they are now called. It just isn’t. If you think it is, have a little lie down and calm yourself...
Secondly, ‘ordinary’ people arrested for sexual offences are not ‘always named’ by the media. The media might sometimes get a tip off if their name, but unless you’re 100% certain your tip is right, naming is very risky...
Thirdly, once someone is charged police usually release their name. Some forces don’t release until they’ve actually appeared in court...
Next, complainants get lifelong legal anonymity as soon as they report the offence, to anyone, not just the police. So, unless you want a criminal record, don’t publish any detail that might lead to the complainant’s identity...
That anonymity remains in place regardless of whether police decide to charge anyone and regardless of the outcome of any trial. So, take care. This counts for social media too, the CPS is watching and they’ve hit a trigger finger when it comes to protecting victims...
The identity of a defendant is not *normally* regarded as an identifying detail about the complainant, provided that anyone reporting it does not include any information suggesting any sort of link or relationship between the two. So, again, take care.
Defendants have no legal right to anonymity. The Cliff Richard case suggests that in the early stages of investigation they do have a right to privacy. That certainly comes to an end if they are charged.
That’s it. Use it as you will.
That said, some people are asking, not unreasonably, why professional footballers are named in these circumstances, while a Tory MP is not. It’s a good question, and I don’t have an answer to it, for the moment.
I now know the answer to this, but frustratingly, can’t explain it, for legal reasons. Suffice to say it is not privacy, rather it appears to be a mistake by the media which has put them in a bind. Sorry to be opaque.
Christ on a bike, this is like whack-a-mole tonight. The anonymity of the MP is nothing to do with this - mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/p… - that just meant there was no longer a public register of arrested MPs. It did not change the law to stop us naming an arrested MP...
Journalists just don’t have a useful register to tell them. Rather shameful on the part of Parliament, but they decided their privacy rights trumped our right to know.
It is *not* what is stopping the naming of this MP. That, I suspect, is post Richard v BBC privacy, or legal anonymity for the complainant, or a bit of both.
