CF & L Limited & Ors v Kieran Fraser & Ors

This is an application for an interim injunction in defamation, harassment and misuse of private information.

The Claimant companies are based in Southend-on-Sea in Essex and are in the business of supplying water cooler and coffee machines. CF&L Limited (“CF&L”) deals with the finance and lease agreements, while iSpy Group (“iSpy”) provides equipment supply, service and maintenance. The companies share a common director, Ms Deborah Morris, the third claimant.

The background to this dispute is a contract over the supply of a water cooler to BJM MOT Limited (“BJM”), the third defendant, which appears to be an MOT testing centre in Stroud. That contract was entered into on BJM’s behalf by Mr Brendon Murray, the owner of that business.

BJM originally sought to cancel this contract as far back as 27 September 2022. In the event, however, the contract was not cancelled but has continued to operate for another three years. Matters came to a head in September 2025 when Mr Fraser made contact with the Claimant companies at Mr Murray’s request in order to try to bring the contract to an end. Mr Fraser works in a marketing capacity for Bespoke Garden Buildings Limited (“Bespoke”), another company owned by Mr Murray.

On 8 September 2025 Mr Fraser wrote an email to the accounts department at CF&L seeking to cancel the contract on behalf of BJM. Kelly Baker on behalf of CF&L wrote back to him saying that as he was not the contracting party they would not deal with him. Mr Fraser then rang iSpy and spoke to two of its employees, Ellie Smith and Gemma Franklin. Later that day Mr Fraser posted highly critical one star reviews of CF&L and iSpy on Trustpilot, the consumer review website, as well as another equally critical review on Google.

A flavour of the reviews is captured by the Google review, which is set out below:

“horrendous service. they use third party companies to tie you into long contracts. the third party companies don’t have any contact details so cancellation is impossible. They do this so the different companies can blame each other. We have been trying to cancel our agreement since September 2022 and between CF&L and iSpy they have made it impossible. Spoke to the commercial manager who was as helpful as an empty fire extinguisher in a burning building who just wanted me to put everything in an e-mail. Have taken their process to trading standards today as I feel the way they do their rolling contracts are beyond criminal. Although we have been trying to cancel this service for three years they are saying the reason the director doesn't know about this is due to [redacted words]. The same director I would imagine has created this hidden process and made it impossible to cancel. When I said about leaving a review of the service I have received Gemma kept accusing me of threatening her. Clearly she is in play to deflect the complaints and not deal with them as her manner is terrible and the customer service is beyond non-existent. If they were not on Companies House I would just assume this is a scam.”

The claims in libel by the two companies relates to these three reviews. The claim in harassment relates to: (a) a phone call between Mr Fraser and Ms Smith and then Ms Franklin on 8 September 2025; (b) email correspondence between Mr Fraser and Ms Baker and (c) the disclosure by Mr Fraser of some private information relating to Ms Morris in the Google review (which is also the subject of the misuse of private information claim and which accounts for the redacted words in the review above).

On 8 September 2025 Ms Baker (who is a paralegal and has the role of Head of Legal at the Claimant companies) sent Mr Fraser what she calls a “Cease and Desist” letter threatening legal action against him unless he removed the Trustpilot reviews, gave undertakings and apologised. I note in passing that the “Cease and Desist” letter does not comply with the requirements for letters of claim in the Pre-action Protocol for Media and Communication Claims, which prescribes specific information to be included in pre-action letters concerning libel and misuse of private information claims.

Mr Fraser responded to Ms Baker’s letter the same day. He said, “The reviews and comments I have made regarding your business are a truthful and honest reflection of my experience. They are supported by evidence and are clearly expressed as my personal opinion, which is lawful and protected under UK law. I will not be issuing an apology nor retracting my statements, as they are accurate and made in the public interest.”

By a claim form dated 26September 2025 the Claimants commenced these proceedings. The application was originally listed before me on 3 December 2025. I was concerned to see that Mr Fraser was not present or represented at the hearing and the Claimants had also requested an adjournment so that Ms Morris could attend. Accordingly, I adjourned that hearing and shortly afterwards Mr Fraser contacted the court by email making it clear that he did wish to participate and the hearing was eventually relisted for the mutually convenient date of 15 December 2025.

The Particulars of Claim are undated. While they do set out, in broad terms, the factual basis of the Claimant’s claims, they are not compliant with the Civil Procedure Rules. CPR Practice Direction 53B – Media and Communication Claims, paragraph 4.2 sets out specific rules for the information that must be contained in the Particulars of Claim where a claim is brought in defamation. None of the provisions in paragraph 4.2 have been properly complied with. The precise words of the statements complained of are not set out. There is no pleading about the extent of publication. There is no pleading of serious harm to reputation as required by paragraph 4.2(3). These are companies that trade for profit, so they should have pleaded the facts and matters they rely on to show that the publication has caused, or is likely to cause, serious financial loss. Instead there is only a vague reference to serious harm having been caused to their “business interests”, without any further details. There is no pleading of any defamatory meaning. The Particulars of Claim also do not contain any statement of truth, as required by CPR 22.1(a).

Mr Fraser has filed a Defence dated 17 November 2025. In relation to the libel claim by the two companies, Mr Fraser states that all the statements made by him were true, or were honest opinion, “clearly recognisable as comment based on true facts”. He also pleads a public interest defence in the alternative. In relation to the alleged harassment, he admits that he stated in the phone call that he would contact Trading Standards and leave a negative review if the issue was not resolved. However, he denies that he made any threats toward Ms Morris or any other staff in the one telephone conversation that took place. He formally requests disclosure of the full call recording or transcript which he says would confirm that no threats were made. He then pleads that “Harassment requires a course of conduct that is oppressive and intended to cause distress. The Defendant’s actions do not meet this test.” The Defence does not appear to deal with the alleged misuse of private information. Like the Particulars of Claim it does not contain a signed statement of truth (though presumably Mr Fraser took his cue from the Claimants in this regard).

The Claimants have filed a Reply, which among other things sets out the Claimants’ case on the contractual history more fully. Again, this has no signed statement of truth. I bear in mind that both parties are litigants in person but the pleading requirements for media law claims are important, as is the requirement for signed statements of truth, so I will give directions to rectify these deficiencies in the order I make after judgment is handed down.

The Claimants’ skeleton argument for the injunction application refers to the AmericanCynanamid test which applies to the grant of injunctions generally and to s.12 of the Human Rights Act 1998, which applies to injunctions that affect the right to freedom of expression and is the test that applies to the harassment and misuse of private information claims. However, the skeleton argument does not refer to the test that applies to libel injunctions, which is different and significantly harder to satisfy.

The rule in Bonnard v Perryman [1891] 2 Ch 269, reaffirmed by the Court of Appeal post the Human Rights Act 1998 in Greene v Associated Newspapers [2005] is that the courts will not grant an interim injunction in a libel case where the defendant seeks to defend the claim as true or by reference to any other available defence, unless that defence is bound to fail. This means that injunctive relief will be refused “if there is any real prospect that the claim might fail”: LJS v Persons Unknown [2017] EWHC 3230 (QB) Warby J at [41].

In Coys Limited v Autocherish [2004] EWHC 1334 (QB), [2004] EMLR 25, Tugendhat J held that the court will only grant interim injunctive relief in a libel claim where:

To this list, one might now add as a second point the requirement to demonstrate the likelihood of serious harm to reputation. The Defendant’s Defence makes it clear that he intends to defend the statements complained of as being true, or alternatively honest opinion. He has affirmed that he will defend the claims on this basis in his witness statement and in his submissions to me at this hearing. Accordingly, the test I have to apply is the rule in Bonnard v Perryman.

Looking first at the elements of the claim that the corporate Claimants must establish, I am not currently persuaded that they will succeed in proving serious harm. By section 1(1) of the Defamation Act 2013, a statement is not defamatory unless its publication has caused or is likely to cause serious harm to the reputation of the claimant. Section 1(2) provides that: “For the purpose of this section, harm to the reputation of a body that trades for profit is not “serious harm” unless it has caused or is likely to cause serious financial loss.”

As Warby J held in Gubarev v Orbis [2020] EWHC 2912 (QB) at [42]: “In principle all cases that fall within s.1(2) require proof of serious reputational harm that results from the statement complained of and financial loss that is (a) serious and (b) consequent on the reputational harm.”

The first and second claimants are companies and they are therefore required to establish that the publications have caused, or are likely to cause them, serious financial loss. Serious financial loss has not been pleaded, as it was required to be. The evidence of the four witnesses who have provided witness statements does not address serious financial loss. In the circumstances, I am not persuaded that the Claimant companies will be able to establish this element of their claims. I am not making any ruling on the question of whether they will in fact be able to show serious financial loss at trial, only that at this stage, for the purpose of this injunction application, this is an area of significant weakness. This point is not determinative, however, as even if I take serious harm out of the equation, I must consider whether Mr Fraser’s defences are bound to fail and, for the reasons which follow, I would still refuse this application.

Mr Fraser raises truth and honest opinion defences. Are those defences bound to fail? Mr Fraser was ordered to put in any evidence in answer to the application by 17 November. I now have a witness statement from him, along with his Defence and also the correspondence on 8 April. From the latter, I note that in an email on 8 September Mr Fraser states, in response to the assertion that his allegations are factually incorrect, that he has further supporting evidence including reviews from customers raising similar concerns, recorded phone calls and video evidence that contact details provided on the companies’ paperwork does not function.

In his witness statement, Mr Fraser refers to other Trustpilot reviews of CF&L as demonstrating that the allegations he made are well-founded. There are only 6 reviews for CF&L on Trustpilot (they span the period April 2024 to October 2025), one of which is from Mr Fraser, but Mr Fraser emphasises that they are all one star. The headlines speak for themselves: “Avoid” (26 Apr 2024), “Awful company to deal” (13 Feb 2025), “Avoid avoid” (24 Apr 2025), “Terrible customer service…” (26 Aug 2026) and “DESERVES A ZERO RATING” (6 Oct 2025). Complaints about difficulties cancelling contracts and being rolled over into new contracts feature in a number of the reviews. The Trustpilot reviews for iSpy are much more varied, with some positive five star reviews, but also a number of one star reviews, particularly more recently (in 2025 there are five 5 star reviews and 3 one star reviews in addition to the Defendant’s review).

The Claimants rely on four witness statements in support of these claims: the witness statements of Kelly Baker, Ellie Smith, Gemma Franklin and Deborah Morris. These witness statements are focussed on the harassment and misuse of private information allegations. They do not address the substance of the wide-ranging criticisms directed against the two Claimant companies in Mr Fraser’s reviews. There is some contemporaneous correspondence in the bundle relating to the contract between CF&L and BJM and a short part of the Reply which sets out a summary of the “contractual history”, but nothing here on the basis of which I could conclude that the Claimant companies are bound to defeat Mr Fraser’s truth or honest opinion defences.

At the hearing Ms Baker submitted to me that Mr Fraser’s reviews wrongly describe the company as criminal and that is causing harm to their business. She submitted that this was a very serious allegation of fact that is without foundation. She argued that Mr Fraser misrepresents aspects of the history with BJM and that although BJM sought to cancel the contract in 2022 in the event they were able to reach an agreement with CF&L and continued with the contract for another three years. She also emphasised that Mr Fraser is not a customer of the companies and that the contracting party was BJM, not him personally. She accused him of misrepresenting himself as a customer in his reviews, when in fact he is not.

In the course of her submissions Ms Baker took me to the contemporaneous correspondence between CF&L and BJM by way of demonstrating how they resolved the dispute over arrears back in 2023. A key document is a letter before action sent by Ms Baker on behalf of CF&L on 30 May 2023, when BJM had fallen into arrears of £314.40 in connection with its quarterly payments of £64.80 for the water cooler. That letter relied on the terms under the contract and BJM’s failure to serve notice as required under the contract and to return the equipment to demand a payment of £1,590.80, (broken down into the rental arrears of £314.40, an administration fee for the letter before action of £300, a termination sum of £712 and a repossession fee of £264). Ms Baker pointed out that the same letter said that CF&L would prefer to resolve matters by agreement and that in the event BJM agreed to resolve matters by paying CF&L £614.40 and continuing with the contract.

Ms Baker took me to the contract to explain that the letter before action properly reflected its terms. I had some difficulty reading the contract because the print is so small but for the purpose of this application I proceed on the basis that what Ms Baker submitted about the contract is correct. She submitted that the contractual terms were standard for the industry and that “we don’t trap our customers”. Ms Baker also showed me the Google reviews of iSpy, most of which appear to be highly favourable. She submitted that a handful of bad reviews from thousands of customers is a record that most companies would be proud of.

Mr Fraser submitted that the test in Bonnard v Perryman is not met. The reviews he had seen on Trustpilot reflected his honest experience. Although he was not the contracting party he did have direct experience of this contract as he works for Mr Murray and is in that garage about three days a week, so he is familiar with the saga over cancelling the water cooler contract. Mr Murray had asked him to contact the Claimant companies to see if he could bring the contract to an end. He submitted that the terms and conditions of the contract are so small “they could be anything”. BJM wanted to cancel the contract back in 2022 but in the end they decided they would rather keep the cooler than spend over £1,000 meeting CF&L’s demands. He said he stood by the reviews he had made and intended to defend them at trial.

Turning to Ms Baker’s submissions, although I am not being asked to decide the meaning of these publications and it would not be appropriate for me to do so, it appears to me that Mr Fraser has a good prospect of successfully arguing that the criticisms directed at the Claimant companies in the reviews are statements of opinion. Reviews typically do involve the opinions of the reviewer and I consider a court might well be persuaded that when Mr Fraser is saying “their rolling contracts are beyond criminal” (the Trustpilot review of iSpy) or “this company is completely criminal” (in the headline and body of his Trustpilot review of CF&L) he is using this word in a pejorative, not a literal sense, as a way of condemning contractual arrangements which he considers to be extremely unfair. I do not read the reviews as alleging actual criminality on the part of the companies or their directors.

The main focus of the reviews is a criticism that the Claimant companies’ contracts impose onerous financial terms in an untransparent way thereby forcing people to stick with the water cooler contracts because the price for leaving is too high. On the basis of what I have seen there does seem to be a factual basis for some of Mr Fraser’s criticisms. The sums demanded by CF&L for terminating the water cooler contract in 2023 were out of all proportion to the arrears. I proceed on the basis that the sums sought reflected the contract, but the contract is difficult to read as the print is so small. It is no answer to say that BJM nonetheless continued with the contract. Mr Fraser’s case is that BJM felt trapped into continuing the contract.

It may be that there are some factual inaccuracies in the reviews, for example Ms Baker says it is not true that the companies are as hard to contact as Mr Fraser alleges. This is one of the factual disputes that may need to be resolved in these proceedings. The question for me at this stage, however, is whether Ms Baker has persuaded me that Mr Fraser’s honest opinion defence is bound to fail.

I am wholly unpersuaded that the test for a libel injunction is met in this case. I have to bear in mind that honest opinion is a liberal defence which protects all manner of opinion including comments which are unfair and unreasonable, providing those opinions are genuinely held. In general terms, it is much easier to defend a libel claim on the basis of honest opinion that it is to defend a claim with truth. There is a strong public interest in people being able to criticise the services of companies in consumer reviews. Put simply, there are good reasons why it is hard for companies to injunct consumers who leave bad reviews.

In my judgement, the Bonnard v Perryman test is not met in this case. Accordingly, I refuse to grant the corporate Claimants an injunction requiring Mr Fraser to take down his Trustpilot and Google reviews.

Harassment is both a civil wrong and a criminal offence. The elements of the tort are set out in section 1 of the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which so far as material provides as follows:

In Dowson v Chief Constable of Northumbria [009] EWHC 907 (QB) Simon J set out a summary of what a claimant must prove in order for a claim in harassment to succeed:

“(1)

There must be conduct which occurs on at least two occasions,

(2)

which is targeted at the claimant,

(3)

which is calculated in an objective sense to cause alarm or distress, and

(4)

which is objectively judged to be oppressive and unacceptable.

(5)

What is oppressive and unacceptable may depend on the social or working context in which the conduct occurs.

(6)

A line is to be drawn between conduct which is unattractive and unreasonable, and conduct which has been described in various ways: ‘torment’ of the victim, ‘of an order which would sustain criminal liability’.”

In cases involving harassment by publication, the Court must take into account the Defendants’ Article 10 rights. As Nicklin J held in Hayden v Dickenson [2020] EWHC 3291 (QB at [44](viii):

“Consequently, where Article 10 is engaged, the Court's assessment of whether the conduct crosses the boundary from the unattractive, even unreasonable, to oppressive and unacceptable must pay due regard to the importance of freedom of expression and the need for any restrictions upon the right to be necessary, proportionate and established convincingly. Cases of alleged harassment may also engage the complainant's Article 8 rights. If that is so, the Court will have to assess the interference with those rights and the justification for it and proportionality: Hourani [142]-[146]. The resolution of any conflict between engaged rights under Article 8 and Article 10 is achieved through the " ultimate balancing test " identified in In re S [2005] 1 AC 593 [17] per Lord Nicholls.”

The application for an injunction in harassment engages s.12(3) of the Human Rights Act 1998, which provides that: “No such relief is to be granted to restrain publication before trial unless the court is satisfied that the applicant is likely to establish that publication should not be allowed.” In general, this means that the claimant has to persuade the court that he will probably i.e. more likely than not, succeed at trial(Cream Holdings v Bannerjee [2005] 1 AC 253).

In relation to the phone call, the key evidence is that of Ellie Smith who provides a witness statement detailing what Mr Fraser allegedly said on the call. There is also a witness statement from Gemma Franklin concerning her call with Mr Fraser after he was passed on to her. Ms Smith says that Mr Fraser said he would “come after both companies” and that he had their office address and would turn up at their office and that he had the home address of Ms Morris and would turn up there and make her deal with him. Mr Fraser denies saying these things. He accepted saying that he would be prepared to return the water cooler to CF&L or to Ms Morris’ home address, but this wasn’t any kind of threat. He said that he only threatened to go to Trading Standards and to write a negative review, which is what he did.

In relation to the email correspondence, Ms Baker takes objection to a remark where Mr Fraser used insulting language in an email and a remark where he rudely calls into question her entitlement to call herself Head of Legal when she is not a solicitor.

Finally, Ms Morris relies on publication of her private information in the Google review as a further act of harassment.

In my view, the email correspondence does not cross the line between the regrettable and the unreasonable into the “oppressive and unacceptable”, conduct of sufficient gravity to sustain criminal liability. A bit of rudeness must be tolerated as part and parcel of everyday life. It is not the role of the High Court to enforce standards of politeness by injunction. The email correspondence must therefore be removed from the equation.

As to the reference to certain facts about Ms Morris’s health condition in the Google review, this was not targeted against her but was part of a review published to the general public (see the second Dowson condition). Furthermore, Ms Morris was not named in the review and the reference to her health condition reflected the explanation that Mr Fraser had been given by Ms Franklin in circumstances where he was not told this was to be kept confidential. For these reasons I do not consider that it is more likely than not that inclusion of this information in the review amounted to harassment of Ms Morris, although I understand why she found it distressing.

This brings the harassment claim down to a single phone call, the facts of which are disputed. Neither of the people whom Mr Fraser spoke to is a Claimant in this action. Ms Morris says she felt threatened by the phone call as reported to her by her colleagues. But even on Ms Smith’s account all Mr Fraser was saying was that he would come after the companies, he was not making threats against any person. This point was sensibly accepted by Ms Baker in her submissions to me.

The Claimants have not persuaded me that they are more likely than not to establish that this phone call amounted to harassment. First, one phone call is not a course of conduct on at least two occasions. Secondly, the conduct alleged on the Claimant’s case does not in my view cross the line from the regrettable and unreasonable to the oppressive and unacceptable, not even close. Raised voices in a phone call and expressions of frustration are firmly in the camp of everyday irritations, annoyances and upset. Thirdly, Mr Fraser’s words were not directed against Ms Morris, but against the company. Fourthly, I don’t believe Mr Fraser knew this was harassment or ought to have known it was harassment. Finally, the contents of the phone call are in any event disputed and I am unable to say the Claimants are likely to prevail in any test of credibility.

For all of these reasons, I am not satisfied that the Claimants have established that they are more likely than not to obtain this relief at trial and I refuse any injunction on the grounds of harassment.

I can deal with this very shortly. Plainly, health-related information is normally information in respect of which a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy. However, the Google review did not name Ms Morris and it referred to her health issue only because this was the explanation given to Mr Fraser as the reason why Ms Morris had been unable to deal with the contractual issues.

Nonetheless, during the hearing and at my suggestion Mr Fraser agreed to amend the review to remove the health-related information. I should record that Mr Fraser very properly made it clear he was doing so out of sensitivity for Ms Morris’ feelings and not as any kind of admission that there had been a misuse of private information, which claim he intends to defend at trial. I accept that amending the review in this way is not any kind of admission but has been done purely out of consideration for Ms Morris’ feelings. During the hearing Mr Fraser edited the review and I was able to see the amended Google review online.

In spite of this, Ms Baker sought to persuade me that an injunction should be granted on the basis that there remains a risk that Mr Fraser might publish this information again. I reject that submission. Mr Fraser did not publish this information anywhere other than in the Google review, he has not tried to publish it anywhere else since and he has amended the review to remove this information. I must assess the future risk from the perspective of the present. My assessment is that at present there is no significant risk of further publication. For this reason, I reject the application for an injunction in misuse of private information.

The claims in defamation against the Second and Third Defendants potentially engage s.10 of the Defamation Act 2013, which provides as follows:

“10.

Action against a person who was not the author, editor etc

(1)

A court does not have jurisdiction to hear and determine an action for defamation brought against a person who was not the author, editor or publisher of the statement complained of unless the court is satisfied that it is not reasonably practicable for an action to be brought against the author, editor or publisher.”

No application is before me in relation to s.10 of the 2013 Act but it seems to me that this provision may be engaged and that it would further the overriding objective for this issue to be addressed sooner rather than later, whether on the court’s own motion or on any application by Mr Fraser.