Mike Nesbitt, former leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, has promised to bring forward a private member’s bill in the Northern Ireland Assembly once an Executive is formed.

Mike Harris of the Libel Reform Campaign told Irish Legal News that the group, which just organised the conference around the issue in Belfast, plans to keep the issue on the agenda until that point.

The campaign is supportive of the draft legislation drawn up by Dr Andrew Scott of the LSE, who was commissioned by Northern Ireland’s Department of Finance in 2016 to review the law.

Mr Harris said: “The aim of the event was to build support around Dr Scott’s two pieces of legislation; emphasise that the law is not fit for purpose and there is a massive amount of public support for reform of the law; and work out ways that we can take the legislation forward.

“Obviously, without an Executive, that’s going to be difficult - but in the next couple of years, we do want to see reform happen.”

The group is already considering further campaign activities this year to persuade local politicians “to take this seriously”, he said.

Dr Scott’s 2016 report found that Northern Ireland currently sees six times more libel actions per capita than in England and Wales.

The law in Northern Ireland has also had a knock-on effect across the UK: in 2015, Sky Atlantic delayed the broadcast of a Scientology documentary out of fears they “would be open to the threat of defamation” in Northern Ireland if they broadcast it, Mr Harris said.