Settlement maybe, but Carole Malone still gets away with it.

Cherie Blair settled a libel dispute with the News of the World today when she was handed a cash payout, as well as a public apology in the NoW paper. The libel in question was committed in a column written by Carole Malone. She had made several assertions in her article:

Malone’s column made a number of false claims, including that Blair had arrived with hordes of secuity men, only made the appearance at the event for publicity purposes and gave “inhuman” responses about the Human Rights Act when questioned in a panel discussion.

Malone’s style of column is questionable. See here and here for two of her more dubious articles being torn apart. Fair call, the News of the World apologised, made a retraction and payed damages (although, it should have never reached this far in the first place. It shouldn’t have been published). However, there still seems to be an injustice here. Where’s Malone’s direct apology? Where’s her retraction? After all, the NoW may have published it, but Malone was the one making entirely false claims. Effectively, unless the NoW enforced internal sanctions on Malone, or made her pay for part of the damages, she’s got away scott free. Why should columnists be allowed to hide behind walls of their employer’s cash?

As long as they have a powerful publication behind them, they’re free to libel whoever they want.