A controversial pro-independence blogger is facing a six-figure legal bill after losing a defamation case against
The former Scottish Labour leader has been awarded costs against Stuart Campbell, who runs the Wings Over Scotland website.
In April a £25,000 defamation action by Campbell against Dugdale was dismissed after she accused him of making
Campbell, who lives in Bath in Somerset, today expressed dismay after a sheriff awarded Dugdale full costs, plus a 50 per cent top-up.
The Record understands his total legal bill will be in excess of £100,000.
Campbell sued Dugdale, 37, for defamation over a column she wrote in the Daily Record on March 7, 2017, referencing his “homophobic tweets”.
The 51-year-old strenuously denied being a homophobe and insisted such an allegation is both “untrue” and “unfair”.
But Sheriff Nigel Ross ruled that although Dugdale’s accusation wasn’t correct her Daily Record column contained “the necessary elements for a defence of fair comment”.
The tweet at the heart of the action, made during the Conservative Party conference on March 3 that year, stated: “Oliver Mundell is the sort of public speaker that makes you wish his dad had embraced his homosexuality sooner.”
Mundell’s father, Scottish Secretary David Mundell, had came out as gay the previous year.
The verdict states that Dugdale is entitled to full costs plus an additional 50% according to laws outlining the fee provisions for solicitors, which cover various factors.
These include the “complexity of the cause, and the number, difficulty or novelty of the question raised”; the “skill, time, and labour, and specialised knowledge required, of the solicitor”; and “the importance of the cause or the subject-matter of it to the client”.
Dugdale today thanked the Record for supporting her during the case.
