Saturday Rant: - Leveson, what a waste of money!

It is the best show in London but The Leveson Inquiry is a grotesque waste of taxpayers' money!

You cannot escape The Leveson Inquiry. It seems every day there are new "revelations" demanding columns of newspaper "analysis" and extensive "in depth" reporting by the "news" channels. The daily proceedings seem to send the Twitterati "wild" with glee! Indeed yesterday the Twitter reaction reached new levels of absurdity with the hashtag #popleveson trending third worldwide! For those not following every Tweet relating to the inquiry it seems yesterday's hashtag involved coming up with "pop songs" whereby words from counsel to the inquiry, Robert Jay QC, formed part of the title to a well known pop track; however, your blogger digresses!

Judicial Cat must confess to being thoroughly entertained by the proceedings; however, as James Max of LBC 97.3 stated (in a personal capacity) the whole process is a "waste of time".

Let's all go down the Strand!

Almost every day this "circus" rolls up in Court 73 of the Royal Courts of Justice. Entrance is free, if somewhat limited, and curtains are at 10am and 2pm each sitting day! Apparently there are only 14 seats for the general public (so get there early). Of course, there is copious room for the "navel gazing" hacks. So much in fact that they have an "overflow" room whereby proceedings are relayed to a "big screen". Your blogger thinks that if there were ever an Olympics Gold Medal for useless inquiries, then Team GB would be far and above the leading contender!

What on earth is this all about?

Officially this is an inquiry into the practices and ethics of the press. It was set up in July 2011 by the Prime Minister, David Cameron, in response to the growing outrage over alleged phone hacking and other misdemeanours at the former News of the World and the parent company News International. The inquiry is looking into how the press operate and also how journalists and politicians interact. There are a number of "modules". Once any criminal inquiries into phone hacking etc have concluded then the inquiry moves on to consider those activities. Anybody who is anybody in the political and journalistic worlds have been asked to give evidence. A report is due in October 2012 on those matters not subject to criminal inquiries; however, Judicial Cat will have a "wager" at this point. As is "usual" with these inquires your blogger would be "amazed" if the inquiry reports on time!

An army of Lawyers mostly at the expense of the taxpayer! 

Your blogger declares an interest in being a member of the legal profession; however, alas, your  blogger was (somewhat surprisingly) not selected to participate in this particular "gravy train". There are the expenses of numerous junior and senior counsel, his Lordship of course, administrative support, firms of Solicitors. Last week individual members of HM Government secured core-participant status entitling each individual minister to be legally represented at the inquiry. So another eight sets of counsel and eight sets of Solicitors. And you can be sure the fees for the individual government ministers will be billed back to HM Government (in other words you the reader). In summary this is a monstrous expenditure on legal fees etc at a time when the country is supposedly having to "tighten the belt".

So what is the nation learning from the inquiry?

Judicial Cat believes nothing but the "blooming obvious". Amongst the more serious revelations is that it seems there was a possible pre-disposition by Culture Secretary, Jeremy Hunt in favour of News Corporation's abortive attempt to purchase the remaining shares in BSkyB. Now there is a strong argument for Jeremy Hunt to resign due to the obvious issues concerning his quasi-judicial role; however, no one who follows these matters could be surprised at Mr Hunt's apparent support of News Corporation. His own website described him as a "cheerleader". A long running and expensive inquiry was not needed to learn this!

Yesterday we were "treated" to the knowledge that our esteemed Prime Minister did not know what "LOL" stood for in the context of sending text messages! Apparently he thought it stood for "Lots of Love". Again, is an inquiry necessary to tell us what many already know; namely, that Mr Cameron is not exactly a "man of the people"?

The daily questions asked by leading counsel to the inquiry are hardly "incisive". A first year student at the Bar could, quite frankly, come up with them! A lot of the questions to witnesses are just wholly irrelevant and are based on gossip and a desire for a "quick headline". Some of the material being examined belongs firmly in an undergraduate history seminar!

Something had to be done so why not this inquiry!

Judicial Cat firmly believes that the correct way of handling matters would have been to restrict any inquiry to whether or not the Metropolitan Police colluded with News International to "play down" the hacking allegations and/or "cover them up". That is something, which is in the public interest and needs to be investigated. Even this aspect should have waited until any criminal investigation/proceedings had concluded. The correct forum for examining the allegations of phone hacking, corruption etc are the criminal courts. The government can then deal with any issues arising from those proceedings.

The Leveson Inquiry was set up to get Mr Cameron "out of a hole". It is the usual response of a government when facing political difficulty arising from "events dear boy" (as Harold Macmillan once called them!) The "circus" will grind on, my colleagues will continue to earn "easy money" and when it is all over ............................. the public will know absolutely nothing they already did not know!