Leveson Inquiry: as it happened November 21

This story featured in The Telegraph, written by Sarah Rainey: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/leveson-inquiry/8906042/Leveson-Inquiry-as-it-happened-November-21.html

12.40 Shear and Leveson are now discussing online stories. Shear describes them as an "extremely difficult problem to confront", while Lord Justice Leveson says they are "the elephant in the room".

Shear continues:

📷You can often create a bigger consequence by contesting than allowing it to pervade.. I have noticed that sections of the media have initiated or encouraged internet tittle tattle in order to bring into the internet information that would not enter the mainstream press.

He discusses the dangers of anonymous posts on Twitter that appear unmoderated on search engines. He says he has tried to engage with Google, Twitter and Wikipedia on the issue, but they have been slow to respond.

12.36 Graham Shear tells the inquiry that his clients have different approaches to taking on media organisations over untrue allegations and intrustion.

He says while some doggedly pursue their claims, others are put off:

📷They feel they are confronting organisations which are enormous and which have extremely deep pockets. As somebody once said to me: 'why take on a newspaper, they just order up another barrel of ink'. And you are at risk in the future.

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Rupert Murdoch's News Corp is one of the world's biggest media organisations

12.33 Martin Evans tweets:

📷NotW was acting unlawfully in its efforts to expose hypocrisy. "The ultimate in hypocrisy" Shear tells #Leveson inquiry.

12.28 Lord Justice Leveson asks Graham Shear if his awareness of press intrusion and phone hacking has lessened or become worse since he was first aware of it in 2003.

Shear says it accelerated between 2003 and 2008 but has now receded:

📷Then, there was an attitude of not just complacency, but that they were almost untouchable. There was a fever pitch of trying to create more and more detailed stories with little or no recognition of the rights of individuals involved.

..I think that people lost their ethical compass here and it was systemic, and there was a real weight for people to push the boundaries further and further. There was this view that they were untouchable and could do almost anything.

12.26 Robert Jay ends his questioning by assuring Mr Shear that all those who hold the contrary view will be given the same opportunity to express their opinions.

Lord Justice Leveson says he has three questions for the lawyer.

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Lord Justice Leveson is rounding up this morning's evidence

12.23 Robert Jay QC asks Graham Shear about the concept of the "public interest". He puts it to Shear that it is difficult to be dogmatic and draw a line under what is in the public interest and what is not.

Shear replies:

📷You can normally separate what is private information from what is information that should be disseminated in the public interest. When you speak of role models, of those who play football, there are different categories there as well. There are those who make their living from their on screen persona, and they have to support that through marketing activities.

It's hard to support the assertion that those who play football, or all those who play for their national team, should be role models to all those who watch them on the field... The vast majority of our professional footballers earn very, very little money from off-pitch activities.

12.13 Graham Shear says he has been using conditional fee arrangements (whereby clients don't have to pay unless they win their case) for five or six years.

However, he denies that CFA procedures are making it too expensive for newspapers to fight claims.

Shear describes the £60,000 fine imposed on the NotW for its allegations about Max Mosley's private life as "a very gentle parking fine".

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Robert Jay QC addresses a busy courtroom at the Leveson Inquiry

12.08 Ben Fenton of the FT says the courtroom is getting busier ahead of today's remaining evidence:

📷A bunch of students/school-age teenagers have just come into the public area of the #leveson marquee. Probably just in time for Hugh Grant

12.05 The lawyer is now discussing an incident at the Grosvenor Hotel in London in 2003, where a number of footballers were accused of rape by a young female guest.

He says his client, whose profile was much higher than those involved, was granted an anonymity order but had to come forward after his name was wrongly linked to the events online:

📷This particular instance was particularly disgraceful. I think that the notion that they had any belief in the integrity of the story was completely set aside by what we learnt later on. This appeared to be an opportunity to buy a video which contained supposedly explicit material. The newspaper decided not to buy the video but to publish an unfounded story, which did not identify but was intended to create speculation about our client.

There seemed to be a desire to dish out some retribution, and they seemed determined to say something that was damaging or intended to damage his reputation as a quid pro quo of having the temerity to take on the media in those circumstances.

12.03 As Shear continues his evidence, James Robinson of The Guardian tweets:

📷Grant waiting turn patiently. Dressed like lawyer not movie star. Told me he's likely to give evidence after lunch but may be sooner #leveson

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Actor Hugh Grant is expected to give evidence after lunch today

12.00 Shear continues on the subject of anonymity orders, which he says are increasingly difficult to obtain:

📷It's very, very hard - if not impossible - to detect a public interest rather than feint interest by the public of being titillated and inserting themselves into the private lives of celebrities.

11.58 Shear says his clients now "rarely" receive pre-publication notice of a story about them. He says papers would rather publish first and then pay damages for breach of privacy at a later date:

📷It's about a change in behaviour and a reluctance to be 'knocked off' a story.

11.56 Martin Evans tweets Shear's words from the Royal Courts of Justice:

📷Some newspapers calculate the financial gain against the penalties when considering publishing a story. #Leveson #hacking

Follow Martin's tweets throughout the day @evansma.

11.53 Discussion in Court 73 has moved on to fees for 'kiss and tell' stories.

Graham Shear says the tariff for 'kiss and tell' type pieces went from £10,000 to £500,000, with high profile figures such as Rebecca Loos getting even larger sums.

He says the practice is "a form of orchestrated blackmail", with 'kiss and tell' girls asking his clients for money to stop them selling their stories to the papers.

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The News of the World's coverage of David Beckham and Rebecca Loos

11.50 Sky's Mark White tweets:

📷Graham Shear says tabloid industry is a business model which has become dependent on titillating and sensationalist stories #leveson

11.48 He is critical of the PCC, saying it is not a regulator but a mediator:

📷Without being empowered and having the teeth to appropriately investigate and regulate the members of the media, they're an ineffective body.

As far as broader investigation is required, the PCC is certainly no match for the broader and larger media organisations they are meant to investigate.

11.43 Graham Shear gives his views on whether phone hacking was widespread within the media:

📷Certainly the News of the World was out in front as the most effective story-gatherer. I think that the types of surveillance that were being undertaken are unlikely to have been isolated to one particular newspaper, simply because of the movement of journalists between newspapers.

..I think that the press are extremely adept at identifying and calculating opportunities, and then exploiting them.

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Graham Shear has represented Chelsea footballer Ashley Cole

11.39 Shear says he sent a list of clients' names to the Metropolitan Police in 2008, asking whether there was evidence of electronic interception.

He says he was told that neither the Met nor the Information Commissioner found any evidence of hacking.

However, Shear was later shown evidence that he had been hacked, including details of private conversations he had with clients in Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks.

11.37 Martin Evans reminds us of the extent of Shear's claims about the press. He tweets:

📷Shear says there were 100 reporters outside his house for 10 hours. #Leveson #hacking

11.35 Graham Shear tells the court about encouraging his clients to take their press complaints further:

📷I became interested in the development of the information that came out of the various criminal trials that had taken place and I asked the clients around about 2007 would they like to take matters forward.

By 2008 a number had indicated that they did. Some didn't - they felt that they could suffer recrimination from the media by actively pursuing a claim, so they didn't.

11.30 Shear says his clients were forced to change their mobile phone numbers twice or three times a year.

He tells the court about an instance in 2008, when he advised two clients to come to his house to escape the press. He left them a voicemail and sent a text containing his home address - but somehow the paparrazi arrived before his clients did, he says.

Shear says he was "flabbergasted" when the media arrived at his house as they shouldn't have known his address.

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Mr Shear has represented Jude Law, who sued The Sun over press intrusion

11.28 Mr Shear is telling the court about an occasion when he was followed by paparazzi on the way to meet a high profile client in rural Oxfordshire.

He tells Robert Jay QC that suspicions about hacking were rife for a number of years:

📷Certainly in the period from about 2004/5 onwwards, clients began to believe that coincidences were being replaced by more likely interception of one form or another. I recall quite clearly clients becoming irritated or frustrated, and quite rightly suspicious, that information was finding its way into the media.

It caused them to ask questions not only of their family and friends but also of me.

11.24 The hearing has resumed.

Graham Shear, a solicitor and partner at Berwin Leighton Paisner, has taken to the stand. He is a commercial litigator who has represented Take That member Robbie Williams and footballer Ashley Cole.

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Mr Shear has acted for a number of high profile clients