Attacking freedom of speech is dangerous, and the proposed ‘truth law’ would provide a mandate to the courts to interfere in our politics, says Dr Luke Cooper. Plus Nathan Sparkes on compelling the press to be truthful
My friend Dr Sam Fowles’s proposal for a “truth law” is well-intentioned but flawed and Orwellian (The big idea: should we have a ‘truth law’?, 18 July). The examples he uses to make the argument simply do not stand up to any scrutiny.
The causes of the 2008 financial crisis are interpretive without black and white distinctions between “truth” and “falsity”. It is also implausible that were such a truth law to exist, the public would, as he implies, suddenly become “right about everything”.
