Lawsuits fought by foreigners who often have no link with Britain should soon be an historical anomaly if Kenneth Clarke has his way. But putting an end to ‘libel tourism’ is only part of the problem.

Defendants can already put forward the defence of fair comment, often with considerable success.

It is not clear how a change to ‘honest opinion’ will either reduce the number of cases coming before the courts or provide a more effective counter to those claims that do.

Even the requirement for a claimant to show ‘substantial harm’ to reputation is unlikely to reduce the workload of Mr Justice Tugendhat, as such a flexible criterion will only encourage those who have the means to have a go at proving that their character or status has been impugned.

Mr Clarke should go much further if he is concerned about freedom of expression in what is supposed to be an open and democratic society.

Since the 1964 case of Sullivan v The New York Times any US claimant in a libel case must show actual malice by the defendant.

This places an almost insuperable burden on anyone minded to initiate such an action – the burden of proof being where it belongs (that is to say, on the claimant), unlike in Britain, where the burden is reversed.

The standard of proof requires that the claimant knew that the statement was false or acted in reckless disregard of its truth or falsity.

As it is almost impossible to prove what was inside a person’s head when the statement was released into the public domain, few cases reach the US courts, and where they do a successful outcome is rare.

If Sullivan was adopted in this country we would see fewer attempts to stifle scientific debate and challenges to what is innocently communicated via the internet – access to which is already severely curtailed by many governments which do not grant their citizens the right to publish with impunity.

Bill Jackson, Solicitor, Nottingham