Tom Crone, head legal honcho at News International thinks he has something to crow about in NI’s staff Magazine “We’re News” (oh yeah?). He thinks that Mr Justice Tugendhat’s lifting of the super-injunction over reports of John Terry’s playing away is “a victory by the News of the World which will lead to a fundamental assessment of our draconian privacy laws.”

   I doubt it, given the ensuing feeding frenzy on the carcase of an old story about Ashley Cole and a more recent kill, Vernon Kay’s infidelity. This simply demonstrates yet again that large sections of the British press just can’t be trusted to find a balance between every individual’s right to a private life and the papers’ own perceived right to trumpet any intimate details (often regardless of the truth) of a public or semi-public figure’s life, that will sell their squalid little rags.

   Inevitably, there will always be a tension between the press (of all hues) who want (and might argue “need”) as few obstacles as possible to their telling the truth about those who are accountable – in some degree to - the public they serve, supply or entertain, and individuals who feel they have a right to protect details of their non-public activities that have no bearing on their public function – even if they do not conform to prevailing moral standards – so long as they are legal.

   Genuine newspapers respect this difference, and are rarely sued for breaches of privacy. But as long as the serious and the rubbish press are subject to the same checks and balances, the recidivist tendencies of the tabloids to damage individuals, with no public interest justification, will have to be curbed by effective statutory legislation despite the concerns of the grown-up press, because self-regulation has consistently failed.

   The Commons Select Committee for Culture Media and Sport spent most of last year hearing evidence for their Inquiry into Press Standards. After the alarmingly amnesiac performance of the News of the World (including Mr Crone’s) in the Committee Room it is likely to recommend that the problem is confronted by setting up an independent, external industry watch-dog, with real teeth and statutory powers of chastisemnt.

The committee will announce their recommendations on Wednesday.

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