Update on the Gina Ford legal situation

[JustineMumsnet]

Hello all,
Some of you may have seen a Gina Ford interview in the Mail on Sunday today, in which she refers to the Mumsnet legal situation, so we thought it was only right to update you as to where we are.

We are due to go to mediation on March 7th. Our position with regard to this hasn't changed - since very early on in the dispute we have suggested mediation as a sensible way forward and so we are pleased to be meeting with Ms Ford and her lawyers on March 7th.

In the meantime GF has issued a claim form, which means that the court clock is now running and we have to put in our defence within 28 days.

Obviously, as Ms Ford has made clear by this action and by her statements in the Mail on Sunday if mediation fails, she intends to sue.

We're sorry that we are still having to ask you not to discuss Gina Ford or her methods but given the potential for something that may be used against Mumsnet to slip through, this probably remains the safest course of action.

We will, of course, keep you fully updated.

Thanks for all your support.
Mumsnet HQ

That's true Xenia- we had our PC watched for a bit , understandably really as I was doing most of my ni research on the internet (erm, every tenth site a fundamentalist Islam site- you learn when to back out quickly!!!), and DH is an electronics bod mainly working from home, on DJ stuff but you'd be amazed how similar the componenets are to detonator type set ups.

They abcked off after a bit- you could tell when they were there, system slowed and spyware picked up robots. But you know, its GOOD they do it in that scenario- it could easily have been a What If?

Xenia, as you say, if the choice was losing the house or... Well...

Tamum, might be an idea to get that thread/post deleted if you can find it?

Cool post from BMC

If you operate through a limited company you don't risk losing your house but presumably that is not the case.

By the way anyone paying legal fees of anyone else I think, but I may be wrong, risks having to pay the fees of the other party if a case is lost so don't donate without taking legal advice.

Yes, thanks, BMC. Much appreciated, our lovely twin site

That's interesting re donating too, Xenia.

How would anonymous donations work I wonder?
If everyone posteda fiver to MN with no other details?

If you operate through a limited company you don't risk losing your house but presumably that is not the case.

But as you can choose to sue person A and not the other 99 people who said something about you.

You can also choose to sue person A (owner of a limited company B) instead of sueing the limited company B.

Of course that means person A is in danger of losing her house, whilst sueing the limited company B wouldn't have this additional option.

Of course IMO sueing person A and potential making her and her family homeless, rather than simply sueing limited company B to make a point, is the act of a cowardly and bullying narrow minded person / people / companies.

Please note that my previous comments are general ones based on the world at large, not to do with any particular person / people / company.

I case involving Hamilton (the MP) and Al Fayed looked at this - he had people funding him. "Both pure and professional funders have found themselves on the ends of applications
made by a successful party that they should pay their costs pursuant to section 51(3) of
the Supreme Court Act 1981."

"In Hamilton the court concluded that the public policy of access to justice superseded the public policy reflected in the principle that costs should follow the event. It was said in that case that a pure funder should not be in any different position than a lawyer offering services under a CFA. In general then, it is difficult to get a section 51(3) costs order against a pure funder."

www.39essex.co.uk/documents/KS_Maintenance_Champerty_May_05.pdf

If the above is right I don't think you've too much to fear.

I've just found it and reported it hunker- better safe than sorry.

Can't see what everybody is worried about. Surely Justine will just take v. cute baby to court and hold infront of her as per photo. All the lawyers will agree that they wouldn't want to do anything that might upset v. cute baby. Case closed. Thats how the world works isn't it?

Good one, Tamum - better safe than sued, I think...

MP, if only that were the case (although cute baby is v cute indeed, so maybe...!).

I think we (or anyone who wants to that is)should send money now as there are already legal fees to cover (viz. the mediation on 13th March). Would someone like to step up to coordinate this?

Maybe Justin will let us know what kind of support Mumsnet need/want ?

Maybe this will be settled on the 13th (crossed fingers)

v cute baby is indeed v cute

and lovely names too

Fio, there's been a huge advert on here for it most of last week, so I don't think you're heading for disaster

Funny thing Fio is that Channel 5 has been advertising the program in Mumsnet! Wonder if they were trying to fish for some polemic

no, not channel 5 - channel 5 life. It's a quite obscure cable/freeview channel.