There were two cases being argued in front of the Supreme Court of Canada which had serious repercussions on freedom of the press in Canada.  The first involved the Ottawa Citizen who published several stories about OPP officer Danno Cusson who went on his own accord to New York City after the 9/11 attacks with his pet dog and lied to rescuers about being an RCMP officer and that his dog was trained for disaster recovery services.  The second case involved the Toronto Star when the paper published stories about an application in Northern Ontario by developer Peter Grant to expand a golf course on lake-side property.  The paper quoted several local residence who were concerned that it "was a done deal" because Peter Grant was a friend of former Ontario Premier Mike Harris.

In both cases the papers were sued and juries awarded defamation damages until the Ontario Court of Appeals found errors in law and ordered two new trials.  In the end however, this went all the way up to the Supreme Court of Canada and they ruled in favour of "responsible journalism", and for the first time applied their ruling to bloggers as well.  The high court agreed with the Ontario Court of Appeals on the conditions of an acceptable defence which include Judging the story as a whole, consider whether it is in the public interest, and consider whether the media outlet engaged in due diligence in trying to check out the facts, even if some later turn out to be incorrect.

What this all means is that the high court found Canada's anti-defamation laws far too strict, and inhibiting free and open debate on matters of public concern.  This really is a victory for free speech and the freedom of the press.