This is exactly what the press & the DM in particular is what you want to think about. Truth or substance does not come into it (chances are his wife may have been there anyway so she would know the truth & be totally aware of how things get skewed).

If they get you thinking about the wife & how she may feel it leads on to another angle for them to exploit.

I've already suggested to Robbie and Natalie via Twitter that they should report the Daily Mail to the Press Complaints Commission.

They are rapidly turning into a new version of the News Of The World. Shame because once upon a time (a long time ago) they used to be a nice newspaper to read. I blame the owner/editor for the direction the newspaper has gone in lately. But it's not only that - it's the fact that most of the journalists working there now don't seem to check their facts before rushing into print. I know there's a saying "why let the truth get in the way of a good story" but they seem to have taken it to another level. Gutter press indeed!

I really hope the Leveson enquiry finally brings in a proper code of conduct that the press are legally bound by, not just a voluntary arrangement that most of them completely ignore.

My thoughts exactly.

It’s articles like this that put me off SCD for years. I never watched the show in the early seasons, but I always remember seeing snippets in Heat or Closer (yes, I read the celeb mags…don’t hate me!) about which pro is rumoured to be sleeping with which celeb…who’s flirting with who…are they/aren’t they…I just all struck me as a bit sleazy and desperate, so I made a point of never watching it.

...Of course, now that I have watched SCD, I understand that it’s not like that at all. But I hope that there are not others out there who see this article and, like myself, make a judgement on the show on that basis. The Daily Mail should be ashamed at printing this so soon after Robbie’s loss. It is gutter reporting of the lowest kind.

I've long thought that a law should be brought in to stop 'anonymous sources'. If a person leaking a story wants to remain anonymous then the tabloid/newspaper shouldn't be allowed to publish. It would stop a lot of the lazy journo stories.

BIB - you are right- they do have rejects from the notw working for them now- the despicable Mr Wooton for instance- the fact the article is gone is enough evidence that the story was false-

The trouble is, its all over the internet not just the Mail site.

The thing is that it was the front page story in the Sunday People, I think, print edition yesterday so obviously that was all done and printed before the news of other events broke.

The problem we have is that the more laws we have that limit the freedom of the press, the closer we come to being a nation that condones censorship of the news. This is why the press was given the freedom to regulate itself in the first place - to avoid any suggestion of Government control over what must, to work effectively, be a free organ.

Protection of sources exists for the very good reason that where there IS a legitimate reason to keep someone's identity secret, journalists cannot be forced to reveal it. Any dilution of this rule would mean a risk to the legitimate cases and so needs to stay in place.

That said, I do agree that the rules have not really been effectively updated to cover sourcinginformation using modern media methods, particularly social media, and that the hacking of any private account should carry clear penalties.

Mr LL (a journalist himself) was recently the victim of journalists' lack of ethics when he was named in a newspaper article after objecting (along with others) to a Worcester City footballer who made racist remarks on Twitter. He was promptly subjected to a torrent of vile abuse from the footballer's mates, some of whom made their own racist credentials clear as a result. He contacted the paper to demand they withdraw his name and the paper refused, saying that because it happened on Twitter, his name was already in the public domain. That covers them legally, but morally - words fail me.

I don't think that my idea does affect freedom of speech though, it just means that the press have to be transparent as to the source of their stories so that they can't just make them up.

But where there is a real reason not to name a source - e.g. because they are a whistleblower working for a company who is trading unethically, or they are actually risking their lives in informing the press - any law that could be used to force the naming of sources would immediately become extremely dangerous.

Personally, I'd rather live in a society where a few stories get made up and taken as the rubbish they are by most people, than in a society where journalists are frightened to use their jobs to expose real wrongdoing and corruption because it would place their sources in danger.

But the problem seems to be that it's not just a few stories any more - it seems to be the majority of them (in the Tabloid press anyway). And it's a sad fact of life that most people, once they've seen a story in print, actually believe it. Mud sticks unfortunately.

I see what you mean. I was only really referring to gutter affair style stories.

I'd fully agree that the tabloids' propensity to make stuff up is staggering, but unfortunately there isn't one law for the tabloids and another for more 'serious' newspapers. These days, it's more and more difficult to draw the line between the two in any case.

Mr LL is working on a live blog of the Leveson inquiry today, and reliably informs me that this inquiry and all the stories related to the current phone hacking scandal - a matter, I think you'll agree, of fairly serious public import - could never have come to light without an anonymous source being involved.

Actually, the phone hacking is a good example in another way, in that the fact it has a large celebrity tabloid angle is overshadowed by its relevance in the Milly Dowler investigation. This inquiry will stop any future families like the Dowlers suffering torment that their daughter is alive, while the police sit back in the full knowledge that journalists are hacking her mobile as a source of stories.

Give them time, they will probably end up suggesting it was a full scale orgy!

The Mail has been reporting as if all the hacking, blagging etc was coming from the News of the World and other News International newspapers but there were far more complaints to the Information Commissioner about blagging by the Mirror Group and Mail Group as well as all the other newspapers to a lesser extent (even the saintly Guardian).

These other newspapers are starting to get mentioned at Leveson - read Alastair Campbell's evidence through either Guido's website or Tom Watson's site (though he has tried to delete it!).

As I said, I do see what you mean, I just think that there could be specific wording in any kind of law to prevent the true or false revelations of a persons private life (alleged relationship/ pregnancy/ affair etc) without revealing the source, unless the story had relevance to a specific political issue (ie- the Profumo scandal). This is the only kind of story in which I think that sources should not be able to remain anonymous due to the hurt/embarrasment it causes to the family members of those involved in cases that are proved as ultimately untrue.

The thing with the Milly Dowler case is that, if the papers had been forced to be transparent in their sources, there would have been no point in hacking her (or anyone elses) phone as it would have been obvious that they were breaking the law. However, they may have found a way around this. I do agree though that whistleblowers on serious issues should be allowed anonymity.

what have i missed then

The flexibility you have to allow in journalism and media law makes it virtually impossible to implement any sort of legal restriction that allows the naming of sources for 'tabloid fodder' stories, but doesn't on 'serious' ones. Media law is too god at finding the loopholes in any law for a prohibition or requirement, no matter how specifically worded, not to be abused at some point.

And TBH, there was no 'anonymous source' required for the story the DM ran today - the combination of circumstances gave them the story, and didn't need support from an 'anonymous source' to provoke speculation. So any law covering the naming of sources still wouldn't have stopped it.

I certainly don't advocate this kind of tabloid story and I'm very much against inventing sources to support your claims, but trying to legislate against it would be the wrong approach.

I know that it would have made no difference to todays story, I was referring to general press standards in these cases.

You may well be right about legislation, it just frustrates me that the press are seemingly able to print what they like and when they are told to apologise, it's done in a small box at the side of page 5 or something. I just can't help thinking that once the dust has settled from the enquiry, the press will slowly go back to their old methods.

I'm not a fan of tabloids... bet you wouldn't have guessed

I see the story has been removed so guess that point has been made to them very forcefully from some quarter.