Songs of praise

Lord Judge used a keynote speech at Justice’s annual human rights conference this month to give what he clearly thought was necessary support to Sir Brian Leveson’s inquiry into the press.

Actually, Sir Brian looks as if he is doing rather well on his own. It was predictable that knockabout journalists like Kelvin MacKenzie would seek to intimidate him—as he has. Yet, Sir Brian appears unperturbed. He has handed down a confident 45 paragraph ruling on why he was not going to bend to “red-top” pressure to appoint more assessors from their camp.

More importantly, Sir Brian has made critics of his arrangements look silly by his conduct of the inquiry so far. Judges do appear to be getting to get to grips with inquiry procedure. Lord Hutton was hobbled by his terms of reference but developed the use of a website to publicise evidence. Sir Brian has begun with two days of open discussion that was filmed as it occurred. Papers