being faultless in the reporting of the facts by the defendant. (Under the law prior to this decision any false statement could, if found to be defamatory, be grounds for damages.) Instead it raises the question of whether factual errors were made in good faith. "Actual malice" means then that the defendant intentionally made false statements of alleged facts, or recklessly failed to verify alleged facts when any reasonable person would have checked. If it is held that the defendant made intentionally false statements of fact, that will form a powerful argument that any statements of opinion based upon those facts were made with malice. If the plaintiff can prove malice on the part of the defendant the common law defense of "fair comment" is defeated. The "actual malice" standard only applies when the statement is about a "public official", or a "public figure", or in some cases about a "matter of public interest". When it does apply it offers so much more protection to the defendant that it would be very rare for the defendant to assert "fair comment" instead. When the allegedly defamatory statement is about a purely private person, who is not a "public figure" in any way, the defendant may need to resort to the defense of "fair comment" instead. Also, the "actual malice" standard is specifically part of United States law, derived from the U.S. Constitution. The defense of "fair comment" is a part of the older common law, and so might apply in non-U.S. jurisdictions which share the common-law tradition, such as the United Kingdom and the British Commonwealth. Canada In Canada, for something to constitute fair comment, the comment must be on a matter of public interest (excluding gossip), based on known and provable facts, must be an opinion that any person is capable of holding based on those facts, and with no actual malice underlying it. The cardinal test of whether a statement is fair comment is whether it is recognizable as an opinion rather than a statement of fact, and whether it could be drawn from the known facts. There was formerly a rule stating that the opinion must be honestly held by the publisher (See Chernesky v. Armadale Publications Ltd. [1978] 6 W.W.R. 618 (S.C.C.)) but this rule was changed to one requiring that the opinion is capable of being held by anyone. (See Rafe Mair v. Kari Simpson [2008]