Lecture notes for ALJ724 - Media Law - SCCA Deakin University July 2013

1. Media Law and
Communicators
What we need to know and why

2. Why do we need to know this stuff
 Every decision about:
 what we communicate,
 how we communicate
 who we communicate to, or
 who we talk about
is made in a legal context
 Journalists, PR consultants and corporate communicators are subject to the
laws of the land; there is no exemption
 Some specific laws are applied to acts of communication including:
 reporting on court cases, whether finished, or ongoing
 giving a reference for someone to an employer or other person
 communications covering children in certain circumstances
 situations in which privacy might be compromised
 situations in which commercial information is being communicated
 Instances where a ‘privilege’ can be claimed or denied

3. The most important reason
The most important
reason for knowing about
media and
communications law is
simply:
SELF PRESERVATION THE "Human Headline" Derryn Hinch is
once again facing the prospect of jail
time after being charged with
contempt of court for allegedly
breaching suppression orders covering
the Jill Meagher murder case.
A FoxNews.com Reporter Is Facing Jail
for Refusing to Identify Police Sources
By CHRISTINE HAUGHNEY
Published: April 9, 2013
AFox news reporter is being asked to turn
over information from her reporting on
the theater shooting in Aurora, Colo., last
summer
Privacy obligations are changing – is your consultancy
ready?
Public Relations and Communication organisations have eight
months to prepare for the vast changes to our privacy obligations.
Time magazine and CNN suspended
Fareed Zakaria, the writer and
television host, on Friday after he
apologized for plagiarizing a New
Yorker article in his column on gun
control in the Aug. 20 issue of Time.

4. Pearson’sThree Imperatives
 Public responsibility
 Abusing freedom of speech is not freedom of
speech
 The public (greater) good must prevail
 Honesty is [mostly] the best policy
 Self-protection
 Costly, painful mistakes, ruined careers
 Do unto others…
 Professionalism
 Professional awareness sets us apart from
‘amateurs’ and ‘charlatans’

5. Communicators and the Legal System
 Australia’s legal system derives from the Constitution and
British common law heritage
 The High Court decides constitutional matters, including the
constitutionality of legislation and legal statutes
 Separation of powers provides a [modest] amount of
independence for the judiciary
 Judiciary + Parliament + Executive (including public service) +
the Media = the Four ‘Estates’

6. Separation of powers
under the Constitution

7. Sources of Law in Australia
Statute Law
 Legislation at state and federal
levels
 S.51 of the Constitution gives
Commonwealth some powers
 States get the rest: health,
roads, education, police &
emergency services
 S.109 says Commonwealth law
prevails in areas of
disagreement
Common Law
 Common law is also known as
‘judge-made law’
 Cases decided in courts and
also interpretation of statute
law
 Higher courts take precedence
 An adversarial system
 Civil and criminal law

8. Hierarchy of courts in Australia
Precedents are
set in the higher
courts and must
be followed in
the lower courts
Appeals from
lower to higher
courts

9. Civil & Criminal Law
Criminal Law
 Offences against the state
 Trial and punishment
 Crimes Act (Commonwealth)
 Criminal Code (State)
 Drugs, theft, assault, sexual crimes,
etc.
 Trespass
 Beyond reasonable doubt
Civil Law
 The rights and obligations of doing
business
 The defence of reputations (defamation)
 Intellectual Property
 Trade practices (including advertising)
 Penalties are usually financial or forms of
restraint on action
 Negligence
 Balance of probabilities

10. Laws affecting creative content creators
 Defamation – laws to protect reputation
 Contempt – laws to protect the sanctity of the legal system
 Copyright – laws to protect creativity and intellectual property rights
 Trade Practices – laws to protect consumers from misleading marketing /
advertising (also consumer law)
 Privacy – laws to protect data about us – not to protect us from media
intrusion
 Broadcasting – laws about who controls radio & television and types of
content
 Blasphemy, sedition, censorship – laws to control content of
communications
 Family – to protect the rights of children and vulnerable people

11. Law is open to interpretation
 The laws affecting the
practices of communication
are subject to both
interpretation and change
 The techno-legal time-gap
 The ethico-legal paradox
“Despite what we may think,
law is not simply about the
black and white of what is
wrong and what is
right…While some aspects of
the law can be stated with
clear and precise
certainty…other laws are
subject to interpretation…”
Leiboff, 2007, p.5
Techno-legal time-gap
Media law does not
always keep pace with
technological change.
For example, the law is
still playing catch-up with
many functions of social
media
Ethico-legal paradox
What is legal maybe unethical
Sometimes ethics and the law
collide