From the David Walliams injunction controversy to the extraordinary legal restrictions surrounding Russell Brand and Jemima Goldsmith, the battle between privacy, harassment and freedom of expression raises a fundamental question: who gets to decide what the public is allowed to know?
There are few legal remedies more powerful than an injunction. A judge can order a newspaper not to publish, a broadcaster not to transmit, an individual not to communicate and, in exceptional circumstances, the world not even to acknowledge that an order exists.
An injunction can protect someone from harassment, intimidation, threats and the publication of genuinely private information. It can protect children, vulnerable people and victims. It can prevent irreparable harm.
But it can also silence people who have something important to say.
And when the person seeking protection is wealthy, influential or famous, while the person being restrained has little or no access to legal representation, the balance of power deserves particularly close scrutiny.
The cases involving David Walliams, Russell Brand and Jemima Goldsmith bring these tensions into sharp focus. They are different cases, involving different legal arguments and different circumstances. They should not be conflated. But together they expose an important question about the operation of English law: when does legitimate protection become disproportionate suppression?
1. What is an injunction — and what can a judge prohibit?
An injunction is a court order requiring someone to do something, or, more commonly in the cases under discussion, prohibiting them from doing something.
It is an equitable remedy, meaning that the court exercises a discretion to grant it where the legal circumstances justify that intervention.
An injunction can be:
- Prohibitory: preventing someone from publishing information, contacting an individual, approaching a property or engaging in specified conduct.
- Mandatory: requiring someone to take a particular action.
- Interim (or interlocutory): granted temporarily, often urgently, pending a full hearing or trial.
- Final: made following the determination of a claim, potentially remaining in force indefinitely.
- Without notice: exceptionally, granted without the respondent being notified beforehand, where there are compelling reasons for doing so. The court must consider the safeguards governing such applications.
The power is considerable. Breaching an injunction can amount to contempt of court, potentially resulting in imprisonment, a fine or seizure of assets through enforcement proceedings.
This is not simply a civil dispute in which someone might eventually have to pay compensation. A court order carries the authority of the court itself.
That is why precision matters. An injunction should identify clearly what conduct is prohibited, who is bound by it, and for how long.
When can an injunction be obtained?
There is no single test applicable to every type of injunction. The legal basis depends on what the applicant is trying to prevent.
For an ordinary interim injunction, the courts commonly apply the principles established by the House of Lords in American Cyanamid Co v Ethicon Ltd (1975).
Broadly, the court considers:
- Is there a serious issue to be tried?
- Would damages adequately compensate the applicant if an injunction were refused?
- Would the respondent be adequately compensated if an injunction were granted but the applicant subsequently lost?
- Where does the balance of convenience lie?
The court is not normally conducting the full trial at this stage. It is deciding whether temporary intervention is justified while the underlying dispute remains unresolved. Bailii+1
But where publication and freedom of expression are involved, there are additional safeguards.
The special protection for freedom of expression
The Human Rights Act 1998 gives domestic effect to the European Convention on Human Rights.
Two provisions are particularly important:
- Article 8: the right to respect for private and family life.
- Article 10: the right to freedom of expression, including the freedom to receive and impart information.
Neither right is absolute. The court must balance them in the circumstances of the individual case.
Section 12 of the Human Rights Act is especially important when someone seeks to prevent publication.
Under section 12(3), a court must not grant relief restraining publication before trial unless it is satisfied that the applicant is likely to establish that publication should not be allowed.
In Cream Holdings Ltd v Banerjee (2004), the House of Lords explained that this normally means the applicant must show that they are more likely than not to succeed, although the court can take account of the particular circumstances.
Section 12 also requires the court to have particular regard to freedom of expression and, where journalistic material is involved, whether publication is in the public interest.
This is not a technicality. It is a deliberate legislative safeguard against the premature suppression of information. Legislation.gov.uk+1
What about allegations of defamation?
There is another important protection for the press.
The principle established in Bonnard v Perryman (1891) makes it exceptionally difficult to obtain an interim injunction preventing publication of allegedly defamatory material.
Why?
Because the defendant might ultimately establish that the allegation is true, or that another defence applies.
If a newspaper is proposing to publish an allegation and there is a real possibility that it could successfully defend its publication, a court will generally be reluctant to silence it before trial.
The courts are particularly cautious about allowing a claimant to achieve through an interim injunction what they might not achieve through a defamation trial.
The principle is not an absolute prohibition, but the threshold is demanding. Bailii+1
This distinction becomes particularly important when a claim originally involving allegations of defamation is pursued instead through harassment proceedings.
2. Harassment injunctions: protection or suppression?
The Protection from Harassment Act 1997 provides a separate legal route.
Section 1 prohibits a course of conduct amounting to harassment where the defendant knows, or ought to know, that the conduct amounts to harassment.
Section 3 provides a civil remedy. A person who is, or may be, the victim of harassment can seek an injunction restraining the conduct.
Harassment can include repeated unwanted communications, intimidation, stalking, threats and other oppressive behaviour.
The legislation exists for a very good reason. People should not have to endure a campaign of threats, intimidation or abuse simply because the perpetrator claims to be exercising freedom of expression.
But there is a critical distinction between preventing harassment and preventing someone from discussing an event.
A prohibition on harassing someone is not automatically a prohibition on talking about them.
A person can be stopped from threatening, pursuing, intimidating or repeatedly contacting another person without necessarily being prevented from speaking privately to a journalist, reporting an alleged offence to the police, seeking medical assistance or discussing their experiences with family.
The wording of the order is therefore crucial.
If an injunction is drafted so broadly that it prevents almost any communication about an individual or an incident, the court must consider whether that restriction is genuinely necessary to prevent harassment, or whether it has become something much wider.
That is the question at the heart of the Russell Brand and Jemima Goldsmith controversy.Legislation.gov.uk+1
3. What is a super-injunction?
The expression is frequently used in newspapers, television discussions and political debate. But it has a precise meaning.
A conventional injunction may prevent publication of particular information.
An anonymised injunction may prevent the identification of the person who obtained it.
A super-injunction goes further: it prevents publication not only of the information in question, but also of the existence of the injunction itself.
In other words, the public may be prevented from knowing both what cannot be reported and that a court has prohibited its publication.
That is an extraordinary restriction on open justice.
It is important not to confuse the three.
| Type | What can be prohibited? |
|---|---|
| Ordinary injunction | Publication or specified conduct |
| Anonymised injunction | Publication of identifying details |
| Super-injunction | Publication of the information and the existence of the injunction |
The distinction was examined by the 2011 Joint Committee on Privacy and Injunctions, following public concern about the use of secret court orders.
The committee stressed the importance of open justice and the need for proper judicial scrutiny of orders restricting reporting. First Report+1
A super-injunction is not a licence to conceal wrongdoing. Nor is it a permanent entitlement to anonymity simply because someone is famous.
There must be a proper legal basis, and the restriction must be justified.
The Ministry of Justice confirmed in September 2025 that applications for these orders continue to be determined by the courts under the established guidance, taking account of Articles 8 and 10 and the public interest. UK Parliament+1
4. David Walliams: when the courts must decide between a person’s private life and the public’s right to know
The Mixtape: Comedian and children’s author David Walliams | RNZrnz.co.nz
The David Walliams case provides an extraordinary example of how far someone may go to prevent publication — and how difficult it can be for the courts to reconcile competing rights.
On 10 November 2026, allegations against the comedian and children’s author became public following the failure of his attempt to secure a permanent injunction against The Guardian and ITN.
The allegations had been the subject of a joint investigation by the two news organisations, which said they had obtained first-hand accounts from more than 30 sources.
The allegations are serious. They include claims that Walliams used his celebrity status to pursue young women and teenagers, including two women who said they first met him when they were 15.
One woman, identified by the pseudonym Alex, told the journalists that Walliams contacted her after meeting her at a fan event in 2004, when he was 15 years her senior. She described a developing relationship involving telephone calls, emails and, later, sexual communications. She alleged that they had sex when she was 17.
A second woman, identified as Jade, alleged that she also met Walliams when she was 15 and that he invited her to his home and initiated sexual contact.
The investigation also reported allegations of inappropriate behaviour towards women in the workplace, including at Britain’s Got Talent and his former publisher HarperCollins. The publisher had previously ended its relationship with him following concerns about his conduct.
Walliams denies wrongdoing. In a letter to the journalists, he said he had sometimes behaved thoughtlessly in casual relationships and regretted not always taking people’s feelings into account. He rejected the suggestion that he had abused his power or was a sexual predator. The Guardian+1
The extraordinary argument put before the High Court
What made this case particularly unusual was not simply the allegations, but the legal argument advanced to prevent their publication.
Walliams sought a permanent injunction preventing The Guardian and ITN from publishing the investigation.
His legal team argued that publication presented a grave risk to his life.
The court heard that he had made two suicide attempts after being approached about the allegations. He had also been admitted to a psychiatric hospital under the Mental Health Act.
His barrister, Sara Mansoori KC, argued that the court had obligations under Articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights — the right to life and protection against inhuman or degrading treatment — as well as Article 8, the right to respect for private and family life.
The argument was that preventing publication was necessary to protect him.
A jointly instructed medical expert accepted that Walliams had a serious psychiatric vulnerability and that publication would substantially increase the risk of psychiatric deterioration and suicidal behaviour.
This was not a trivial concern. The judge acknowledged that the risk was genuine and grave.
But the crucial question was whether that risk justified suppressing the journalism.
Why did the judge refuse the injunction?
Mr Justice Nicklin rejected the application.
He accepted the seriousness of Walliams’ condition and the potential impact on his teenage son. But he concluded that the state was already taking substantial measures to protect Walliams through psychiatric treatment and that the court was not obliged to eliminate every residual risk by preventing publication.
He also considered the rights of the women whose accounts formed the basis of the investigation.
The judge recognised that an injunction would prevent not only the media organisations from publishing, but also the sources from communicating their experiences to the public.
He described the proposed restraint as a comprehensive and potentially indefinite interference with freedom of expression.
The judge’s central concern was the wider precedent.
If the threat of self-harm were sufficient, by itself, to prevent publication, the consequences for journalism and public debate could be profound.
As he observed, the threat could be attached to almost anything.
The court concluded that the public interest in the investigation outweighed the case for the proposed restriction.
Walliams was given an opportunity to appeal. His lawyers subsequently confirmed that he would not appeal within the deadline, allowing the media organisations to publish the allegations. The Guardian+1
What does this mean for press freedom?
The ruling is important because it demonstrates that even a genuine and grave threat to an individual’s welfare does not automatically override the public interest in journalism.
It also reinforces a distinction that is sometimes overlooked: a court refusing to grant an injunction is not making a finding that the allegations are true.
The High Court did not try the allegations. It decided whether the proposed restriction on publication was justified.
Those are entirely different questions.
There must be room for responsible journalism to investigate serious allegations, particularly where they concern the conduct of influential public figures and the use of positions of power.
Equally, those accused must have the opportunity to respond, and journalists must distinguish evidence from allegation.
The principle should be simple:
The public interest in hearing an allegation is not proof of its truth. But the possibility that an allegation may be damaging is not, by itself, a reason to prevent the public from hearing it.
5. Russell Brand and Jemima Goldsmith: the injunction that raises even more troubling questions
Russell Brand: ‘I want to address the alienation and despair’ | Russell Brand | The GuardianJemima shares collage video of PTI founder along with son Qasim KhanOfficial portrait for Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park – MPs and Lords – UK Parliament
The Russell Brand and Jemima Goldsmith case raises a different, and arguably more complicated, set of questions.
It concerns an injunction obtained in 2015 against Szilvia Berki, a woman who had made allegations against Brand following an encounter at Goldsmith’s home in 2014.
The injunction was obtained under harassment law, rather than as a conventional privacy injunction.
But its reported terms have raised serious questions about whether an order intended to prevent harassment went considerably further.
What happened in 2014?
Berki, a massage therapist, had been booked to give Brand a massage at Goldsmith’s home in June 2014.
She subsequently made allegations to the police concerning an encounter with Brand.
According to reporting by The Guardian, police concluded there was no case to answer.
Goldsmith has said that she was present throughout the encounter, did not see anything untoward and provided police with a statement and CCTV footage.
She has also said that she subsequently experienced threatening and abusive communications from Berki.
Brand and Goldsmith brought proceedings against Berki, initially including a libel claim, but ultimately pursuing a harassment claim.
In October 2015, Mr Justice Jay granted a final injunction after summary judgment. Berki represented herself and there was no trial at which the underlying allegations against Brand were determined.
This is an important distinction.
The court proceedings concerned the alleged harassment. They did not establish, through a trial of the evidence, whether Berki’s allegations against Brand were true or false. The Guardian+1
What did the injunction actually prohibit?
This is where the controversy becomes particularly significant.
According to the investigation published by Dan Neidle’s Tax Policy Associates on 7 November 2026, the final order did more than prevent Berki from harassing Brand and Goldsmith.
It also restricted her ability to communicate information about the events.
The reported restrictions included:
- Restrictions on contacting journalists.
- Restrictions on communicating information about the incident.
- Restrictions on discussing the matter with friends and family.
- Restrictions which, on the face of the final order, appeared to prevent disclosure to the police.
- Restrictions affecting disclosure to medical professionals and therapists, subject to limited exceptions.
The order also included a requirement for Berki to pay £50,000 in legal costs within two weeks, with enforcement consequences if she failed to pay.
Tax Policy Associates argues that the restrictions went far beyond what was necessary to prevent harassment and effectively operated as a prohibition on discussing her allegations.
The organisation also reports that the original interim order contained a narrow exception for contacting the police, but that the final order did not contain the same exception.
This raises a fundamental question.
If the purpose of an injunction is to prevent harassment, why should it prevent someone from speaking to the police, a journalist, a doctor or even a member of their own family?
It is a question that deserves serious examination.
There is, however, an important qualification: the underlying allegations made by Berki were never established at trial, and the subsequent convictions of Brand do not establish what happened during the 2014 encounter. Tax Policy Associates+1
Was this a super-injunction?
It is important to be precise.
The order is frequently discussed as a secret injunction, but the central issue is not simply whether it meets the technical definition of a super-injunction.
A classic super-injunction prevents publication both of the protected information and of the existence of the order.
The Brand-Goldsmith case is principally controversial because a harassment injunction reportedly contained exceptionally broad restrictions on what Berki herself could communicate.
The distinction matters. We should not casually label every restrictive or confidential court order a super-injunction.
The more important question is whether the actual terms of the order were necessary and proportionate to the harassment it was intended to prevent.
The Court of Appeal concerns
The matter did not end with the original order.
According to Tax Policy Associates, Berki subsequently sought to challenge the restrictions, and the Court of Appeal considered the matter again in September 2026.
Lady Justice Falk declined to reopen the earlier decision, but expressed concern about the apparent breadth of the order.
She observed that, on its face, it appeared to prevent further communication with the police, communication with other claimants in civil proceedings and disclosures to treating doctors or therapists.
She indicated that the appropriate route to address those concerns was an application to the High Court to vary the injunction in light of changed circumstances.
That is significant.
The fact that an injunction has been made does not mean that its terms can never be reconsidered.
Where circumstances change, or where an order appears to impose restrictions beyond what is necessary, an application to vary or discharge it may be appropriate. Tax Policy Associates+1
6. Zac Goldsmith’s intervention: an important defence of his sister
The renewed controversy prompted an intervention from Jemima Goldsmith’s brother, Zac Goldsmith.
His contribution is important because it provides a different perspective on why the injunction was sought.
In a post on X, Zac argued that the order was an anti-harassment injunction, not a privacy injunction.
He wrote:
“The injunction that my sister @Jemima_Khan is being battered for having taken out is an anti harassment injunction, not a privacy one.”
He continued:
“The injunction was taken out to protect Jemima & her family”
He alleged that Berki had subjected them to an extensive campaign of antisemitic, violent and frightening threats and abuse.
Zac said that Berki had spoken extensively to the press and police before the police concluded that no criminal offence had been committed.
He also published examples of the messages which he said had been shown to the judge, including antisemitic insults, threatening language and messages which appeared to suggest physical violence.
One particularly disturbing message referred to Jemima as a “deeply rotted JEWISH Bitch”.
Zac’s argument is that his sister was entitled to seek protection from an alleged campaign of intimidation and that the fact Brand subsequently faced criminal convictions does not retrospectively make the harassment injunction wrong.
That is a legitimate point which deserves consideration.
Nobody should be subjected to antisemitic abuse, threats or intimidation. Nor should anyone be expected to tolerate a sustained campaign of harassment simply because the person responsible also has allegations to make about somebody else.
The right to report an alleged offence does not confer a right to threaten or harass an unrelated individual.
But there is another side to this argument.
Even if the original application was entirely justified, does that automatically justify every restriction subsequently imposed?
And should an injunction intended to protect Jemima Goldsmith and her family have prevented Berki from discussing the underlying incident with journalists, family members or the police?
Those are separate questions.
Zac Goldsmith’s defence of the reason for seeking the injunction does not, by itself, resolve the question of whether every provision in the final order was necessary and proportionate.
The two issues must be examined independently.teapawt+2
7. Jemima Goldsmith’s own allegations against Russell Brand
There has been another significant development.
Following Brand’s criminal conviction and sentencing, Jemima Goldsmith made public allegations about her own relationship with him.
In a statement published on social media on 9 November 2026, she said she had experienced what she described as violence, coercive control and abuse during their relationship.
She alleged that, during a violent incident in 2014, she had to call the police to have Brand removed from her home.
She explained that she had chosen not to pursue charges or speak publicly at the time because she was concerned about the effect of press attention on her teenage children.
She also said that she had assisted journalists investigating Brand and had been prepared to testify about his behaviour if a newspaper publishing the victims’ accounts had been sued.
Her statement is particularly significant because it provides her own account of the relationship and explains why she says she sought the injunction.
It also illustrates the difficulty of treating these proceedings as a straightforward dispute between a celebrity and someone making allegations against him.
Goldsmith has her own account of events, her own reasons for seeking protection and her own experiences.
She has also said that the subsequent media coverage of the injunction has exposed her to further abuse. The Guardian+1
Russell Brand’s criminal conviction
The wider context has changed substantially.
On 5 November 2026, Brand was convicted by a jury at Southwark Crown Court of one count of rape and three counts of sexual assault involving four women.
The offences took place between 2004 and 2009.
He was acquitted of two further rape charges and one charge of attempted indecent assault.
On 9 November, he was sentenced to ten years and six months’ imprisonment and ordered to sign the sex offenders’ register for life.
These are criminal convictions, not allegations.
They followed a four-week trial in which the prosecution presented its evidence and the jury reached its verdicts.
But there is an important legal distinction: those convictions do not establish that Berki’s separate allegations concerning the 2014 encounter were true. Nor do they retrospectively determine whether the injunction was properly granted in 2015.
The two matters must remain distinct. Metropolitan Police+1
Nevertheless, the convictions make the continuing restrictions on Berki’s ability to discuss her own allegations particularly worthy of scrutiny.
If the police, journalists or prosecutors wish to examine historic allegations, witnesses must be able to communicate with them within the law.
A civil injunction should not become an obstacle to the proper investigation of potential criminal conduct.
8. Can an injunction prevent someone from speaking to the police?
This is one of the most important legal questions raised by the Brand-Goldsmith case.
The police have a responsibility to investigate potential criminal offences. A civil injunction is not intended to give private individuals the power to determine what the police can investigate.
An injunction may impose restrictions on the person against whom it is made. It may also protect confidential information or prevent harassment.
But the court must consider the public interest in reporting crime and the proper administration of justice.
In the Brand-Goldsmith case, the reported wording of the final order appears particularly problematic because the express exceptions for communication with the police in the earlier interim order were not carried across into the final order.
That is the concern identified by Tax Policy Associates and reflected in the Court of Appeal judge’s observations.
It does not follow that every injunction containing restrictions on communication is unlawful.
Nor does it follow that a person can simply ignore an order because they believe it is too broad.
An injunction remains binding until it is varied, discharged or overturned.
Anyone subject to an order should seek legal advice and, where appropriate, apply to the court for clarification or variation.
The issue is whether the court should have imposed such a broad restriction in the first place, and whether it should continue to do so now.
9. Can an injunction be challenged or overturned?
Yes.
An injunction is not necessarily the end of the legal process.
Depending on the circumstances, there may be several options.
1. Appeal
A party can seek permission to appeal against the decision to grant an injunction. The appeal court will consider whether the original decision involved an error of law, a material procedural irregularity or an unjustified exercise of discretion.
2. Application to vary
A party can ask the court to change the wording, scope or duration of an injunction.
This is particularly important where circumstances have changed or where the existing restrictions have become disproportionate.
3. Application to discharge
A party can seek to have the injunction removed altogether, for example because the legal basis for the order no longer exists.
4. Challenge to the original proceedings
In exceptional circumstances, a final judgment may be challenged where there has been a serious procedural failure or other grounds recognised by the law.
There are strict rules and time limits. An unsuccessful party cannot simply reopen a case because they disagree with the outcome.
In Berki’s case, the Court of Appeal’s September 2026 decision is particularly relevant because it identified the High Court application as the appropriate route for addressing concerns about the breadth of the existing order.
10. The bigger issue: are injunctions becoming a means of silencing uncomfortable truths?
There is a reason why injunctions exist. They can be essential instruments of justice.
They can protect victims of stalking, domestic abuse and harassment. They can prevent the publication of intimate images, protect children and stop the disclosure of genuinely confidential information.
But there is a danger when the legal process itself becomes the punishment.
Consider the imbalance that can arise when a wealthy claimant instructs leading counsel and a well-resourced legal team, while the person being sued is unrepresented and potentially faces substantial costs.
Even if the defendant believes they have a legitimate defence, the prospect of crippling legal bills, bankruptcy or imprisonment for breaching an injunction can be enough to silence them.
This raises questions about the relationship between injunctions and Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation — commonly known as SLAPPs.
SLAPPs are legal proceedings used, or alleged to be used, to intimidate, exhaust or financially overwhelm people seeking to expose matters of public interest.
Not every claim brought by a wealthy person against a critic is a SLAPP. Nor is every harassment injunction an attempt to suppress legitimate speech.
But the potential for abuse must be recognised.
The Russell Brand and Goldsmith proceedings demonstrate why courts must scrutinise the actual effect of an order, not simply the label attached to the claim.
A harassment injunction should protect people from harassment. It should not become a convenient substitute for a defamation injunction where the real objective is to prevent somebody discussing allegations.
Similarly, privacy law should protect genuine privacy interests, not provide a general mechanism for preventing legitimate scrutiny of powerful individuals.
The David Walliams ruling illustrates the opposite side of the same problem: the courts must also recognise that a person’s privacy, family life and personal safety are real interests, even when the person is a public figure.
The answer cannot be that the press always wins.
Nor can it be that the person with the deepest pockets always wins.
It must be a proper, evidence-based and proportionate application of the law.
11. What should change?
There are several questions that Parliament, the judiciary and the legal profession should be prepared to address.
First: greater scrutiny of the wording of injunctions.
Orders should be narrowly drafted and should prohibit only what is necessary to achieve their legitimate purpose.
Second: express protection for reporting crime.
Where appropriate, injunctions should expressly preserve the ability to communicate with the police, prosecutors, regulatory bodies and other relevant authorities.
Third: proper protection for journalists and whistleblowers.
The right to receive information from sources is an important part of Article 10. Restrictions should not unnecessarily prevent people from speaking to journalists about matters of legitimate public interest.
Fourth: meaningful access to justice.
Courts must be alert to the consequences when one party has substantial financial resources and the other is unrepresented.
Fifth: transparency and accountability.
The reasons for granting restrictive orders should be properly recorded. Where confidentiality is necessary, the restrictions should be reviewed periodically and should not continue indefinitely without justification.
Sixth: effective mechanisms for varying and discharging orders.
If an injunction has become disproportionate, there should be a practical and accessible route to have it reconsidered.
The principle of open justice should be the starting point, not an inconvenience to be overcome.
12. The final question: who protects the public from the misuse of legal power?
There is an uncomfortable irony in these cases.
The law is intended to protect people from abuse of power.
But the law itself is an instrument of power.
An injunction can protect a woman from a campaign of antisemitic threats. It can protect a vulnerable person from harassment. It can prevent the publication of private information that has no legitimate public interest.
But it can also prevent someone from speaking about something that may be important to the public, to the police or to a future investigation.
The David Walliams case demonstrates that even an extremely serious personal risk does not automatically justify suppressing matters of substantial public interest.
The Russell Brand and Jemima Goldsmith case demonstrates why a legitimate reason for seeking protection does not necessarily justify every restriction contained in the resulting order.
And the distinction between the two cases is crucial.
We must be capable of defending Jemima Goldsmith’s right to protection from antisemitic abuse while simultaneously questioning whether the injunction against Berki was drafted too broadly.
We must be capable of respecting David Walliams’ mental health while defending the right of journalists and their sources to discuss serious allegations.
We must be capable of supporting victims without abandoning the principles of fairness, evidence and due process.
That is what the rule of law demands.
An injunction should be a shield against injustice, not a sword to silence inconvenient voices.
And perhaps the most important question is this:
If the law can prevent someone from speaking, who ensures that the law itself is not being used to prevent the truth from being heard?
Andrew Eborn is a non-practising barrister, international lawyer, broadcaster and President of Octopus TV Ltd. He regularly comments on legal, political and social issues.
This article discusses reported proceedings and allegations as at 10 November 2026. It distinguishes allegations from established findings. It is commentary, not legal advice.
Editorial and legal references
For publication, I would retain these sources as the factual and legal foundation of the article:
- The Guardian — Legal issues surrounding the David Walliams injunction, 10 November 2026.
- The Guardian / ITV News — Investigation into allegations concerning David Walliams, 10 November 2026.
- Tax Policy Associates — The injunction that permanently silenced Russell Brand’s accuser, 7 November 2026.
- The Guardian — Jemima Goldsmith’s statement about Russell Brand, 9 November 2026.
- Zac Goldsmith’s public statement concerning the harassment injunction.
- Crown Prosecution Service — Russell Brand sentencing statement, 9 November 2026.
- Protection from Harassment Act 1997, section 3.
- Human Rights Act 1998, section 12.
- Joint Committee on Privacy and Injunctions — Parliamentary report on super-injunctions and open justice.
