Published:  Suffolk Business Magazine

Date: March 2011

Author: Paul Whittingham

Fans of the BBC TV show “Top Gear” may be pleased to see a new series underway, complete with a new “Stig”.   The Stig is the “tame racing driver” who track tests cars and whose identity has always been a secret until it was finally revealed last year.  This revelation gave rise to an interesting High Court case resulting from the BBC’s attempt to get an injunction to prevent disclosure of the real name of The Stig and the publication of his book.

The BBC sought an injunction against Ben Collins (The Stig), HarperCollins (who were publishing his book), and a service company of Ben Collins, which was the company through which he had provided his services to the BBC.

The use of the service company caused some of the difficulty for the BBC.  They put clauses in the contracts, which said, “You …must not disclose information about the programme or your contribution to the programme”.  Taken literally, that would mean that the service company could not reveal its own identity.  The judge interpreted it to mean that the service company could not reveal its name nor the name of Ben Collins as being The Stig.

The problem was that Ben Collins himself was not a party to the contract and therefore he was under no personal contractual duty of confidentiality.  

There is, however, a duty of confidentiality, which can arise outside of a contractual situation where confidential information is shared with someone on the understanding that it is to kept confidential.   The judge took the view that Ben Collins was subject to such a duty.  

Despite this, the judge said that he could not grant an injunction against Ben Collins now because his identity as The Stig was now in the public domain as it had already been revealed in newspaper articles.    

The BBC also applied to prevent the publication of the book. They argued that as Ben Collins was presumed to be the initial source of the leak, he should not be allowed to profit from his earlier breach of confidentiality.    This was also refused on the grounds that publication of the book would not do additional harm now that the secrecy had gone and would amount to punishment of Collins, not protection for the BBC.

“And on that bombshell, good night”

Please contact Paul Whittingham for further information on this article.