The enormous cost of British libel law is a threat to national security. For the sake of enriching London barristers, Keir Starmer is preserving an unreformed and rapaciously expensive legal system that is wide open to abuse by oligarchs and dictatorships. And he knows it.

When he was a young barrister in the 1990s,Starmer represented Helen Steel and David Morris . McDonald’stried to crush the two environmental activists because they had criticised its treatment of animals. The 1997 ‘McLibel’ affair remains notorious as the longest trial in British history .

‘This case shows the absurdity of the libel laws,’ Starmer said at the time .

Now almost 30 years on, he is prime minister, and yet he does nothing to give the people of this country a legal system they can afford to use. Ins

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