“One principle on which damages are awarded in defamation proceedings is that they are assessed as at the point of assessment. Of necessity, they are not in fact assessed at the date of publication, nor are they notionally assessed then. A further consequent principle is that conduct of the defendant after the publication may aggravate or mitigate the damage and therefore the award. Each case depends on its own facts and this will apply to the determination of compensation under section 3(5). That said, if an early unqualified offer to make amends is made and accepted and an agreed apology is published, as in the present cases, there is bound to be substantial mitigation. The defendant has capitulated at an early stage without pleading any defence, has offered to make and publish a suitable correction and apology (and has in fact done so in agreed terms in the present cases) and has offered to pay proper compensation and costs, these to be determined by the court if they are not agreed – see sections 2(4), 3(5) and 3(6). The claimant knows that his reputation has been repaired to the full extent that that is possible. He is vindicated. He is relieved from the anxiety and costs risk of contested proceedings. His feelings must of necessity be assuaged, although they may still remained bruised (and he is still entitled to say so, if that is so). He can point to the agreed apology to show the world that the defamation is accepted to have been untrue and unjustified. There may be cases in which some of these features are absent, or in which their impact may be slight. An example could be if the defendant had offered and published a correction and apology, which the claimant had not agreed and which the court found to be unsuitable and insufficient – see section 3(5), second sentence. There may also be aggravating features, although the use of the procedure would generally suggest that there is unlikely to be significant aggravation after the making of the offer to make amends. "A healthy discount" may be a more colourful phrase than "substantial mitigation", but they mean the same thing. ………… The adoption of the procedure will have what the judge referred to as a major deflationary effect upon the appropriate level of compensation because adopting the procedure is bound to result in substantial mitigation. I do think that the judge's use of the word "rewarded" in paragraph 41 is superficially open to misinterpretation. But there is no distinction in substance between a reduction in compensation on account of the substantial mitigation bound to result from the use of the procedure and a "reward" for using the procedure, provided that the mitigating factors are not brought into play twice.”
“I am quite satisfied that each of the claimants [has] merited an award at the highest permitted level. Indeed, they have earned it several times over because of the scale, gravity and persistence of the allegations and of the aggravating factors.”