R.H.A. Meeting Ends in Slander Action
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DAMAGES of £1 were awarded at Lincolnshire Assizes last week to Alexander Lyall Maclntyre, Brumby House Farm, near Scunthorpe, an official of the Fatstock Marketing Corporation and a former farmer, for alleged slander by David Edward Langton, cattle haulier, Cemetery Road, Winterton. The action arose out of statements made at a meeting of the Road Haulage Association in Lincoln in May, 1955.
Mr. A. J. Flint, for MacIntyre, said that heavy damages were not sought, but his client wished to clear his name.
It was alleged that at the meeting Langton said: "One cannot do business with Mr. MacIntyre unless you give him £50, and I have that in black and white," and "Mr. MacIntyre said that if 1 gave him £50 he would give me all the work I wanted."
Langton, in evidence said that he had at one time been in partnership with MacIntyre.
Mr. Justice Stable told the jury that the question of damages arose only if the words were spoken. It had been stated that Mr. MacIntyre had no desire to make money out of the action. To say that a man allocated work and gave it out to those who greased his palm was a serious charge and in the ordinary way would call for a figure for damages that he would regard as substantial and in proportion to the gravity of the defamation.