Journalist's reputation marred by superinjunction

Leverhulme in London ... At the wedding ... Remembering Gilbert Gray QC ... And Andrew Marr's superinjunction - when journalists muzzle the media

Prime Minister with hairdresser The tabloid nuptials have come and gone.

Britons displayed their unrivalled talent for organising spectacular pageants.

A sour-faced fun-crusher scraped-up by Sky News on wedding eve, urged us to give the disgusting event a miss. She called it bread and circuses.

I expect she had never heard of Juvenal, but I reflected briefly on what the world would be like if people such as her were in charge.

OMG as they say on Twitter, I think they are.

There was also a fair bit of the usual pommy superiority. Prime Minister Julia Gillard's partner was referred to as a "hairdresser turned estate agent."

The barely-known David Beckham was said to have breached etiquette by wearing his OBE on the wrong side.

Although to be fair, said television host Alexander Armstrong, it had been on the correct side when he'd checked in the mirror.

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BBC journalist Andrew Marr (right)Hypocrisy is as prevalent in the Old Dart as snobbery.

Andrew Marr, a telly host with a radio face, copped plenty of abuse when he revealed he had taken out a super-injunction some years ago to stop the reptiles telling the world he had impregnated a young woman who not his wife.

He came clean when Ian Hislop of Private Eye got close to releasing the balloon.

By going for the judicial gag Marr, as these people often are, was only interested in protecting his family. He didn't give a thought for himself.

Andy appears on our screens each Sunday morning at 9am. He has a current affairs show and is the sort of chap who rubs his hands together before he starts work.

He doesn't flinch from delivering the odd doosra and once asked Gordon Brown if he was taking anti-depressants.

A perfectly reasonable question you might think and many miles away from an invasion of the former PM's privacy.

Marr, bless him, is no George Clooney. But then neither is he Albert Einstein. The wigs must have fleeced him of thousands for the super-injunction and then Andy coughed up some hefty maintenance payments for the kiddie.

One problem: it turns out that the sprog wasn't his in the first place.

But Marr's interviewing style is far more troubling than his personal shenanigans.

He is one of those gifted interrogators, and they are growing in number, who really doesn't need a guest.

Witness his sterling effort last year with Baroness Shirley Williams, a woman not known for her reticence.

Andrew Marr: Here's an unfair question to start with, but a funny one which comes from your book. You recall early on meeting the first female MP ever, Lady Astor ...

Shirley Williams: Indeed.

Marr: ... and she said to you, 'What would you like to be?' and you said, 'I'd like to be a politician'. And she said, 'Not with that hair'.

Williams: She did. I've never forgotten it. I was very small, I was about seven, and my father had foolishly introduced me to her and she looked at me with complete contempt.

Marr: Now you were brought up in this very political world because your mother, Vera Brittain, was a peace campaigner, well-known writer; your father was a political scientist. You had politicians in and out of the house all the time. You really got an extraordinary early introduction to I suppose Leftish political life?

[SNIP - You get the drift. Shirley got in a few more words of affirmation before this humdinger of a question.]

Marr: When you came back - on the trip back, a very dangerous trip back during the war - you were very nearly the victim of what was basically a gang rape by Portuguese sailors.

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Gilbert Gray: two hours of freshnessThe Yorkshire bar is mourning the passing of Gilbert Gray QC who joined the celestial choir last month.

Gray was a legendary after-dinner speaker, fast on his feet and a master of the language.

He was never afraid to take on difficult assignments. He represented the ruthless murderer Donald Neilson and gave character evidence for Jeffrey Archer.

In the Neilson trial, one of the prosecutors was unnerved by Gray's eloquence and passed the following note to detective John Morrison.

"Every line a headline, every phrase a gem,
At the going down of the sun, and in the morning,
The jury will remember them."

"While they probably did," Morrison noted years later, "it is just as well they did not act on them."

*   *   *

 I spoke to Sir Christopher Holland, a former High Court judge, who often appeared against Gray in court.

He told me about the time Gilbert Gray defended a chap in a mob-handed, gun-running case in the Winchester Crown Court. There were several silks at the bar table.

These were the good old days when interviews with suspects were not electronically recorded and the Old Bill took dodgy notes.

Prosecutors were keen to get the policemen to read the notes to the jury.

However, it first had to be established that the notes were made when the events were fresh to the bobby's memory.

Mr Justice Brabin, a noisy judge even by his own admission, was hearing a voir dire.

Gray submitted that the note book evidence should not be admitted because it had been made two hours after the interview.

It could not, he said, have been "fresh to the memory."

"Nonsense!" barked Brabin. "The witness's memory is bound to be fresh after only two hours. It will be admitted."

The trial proceeded.

Gray then put some evidence to a witness that had been given previously.

The judge interrupted and said that what Gray was putting was not his understanding of the evidence.

He and Gray argued for a while then the judge said:

"Why are we arguing Mr Gray when there are all these very expensive juniors here who must have taken a note?"

He turned to the prosecuting junior who read out what he had written. It wasn't what the judge wanted to hear.

"Rubbish!" said Brabin and went down to table, one by one. None of the juniors gave him any joy.

Gray's junior was last and said gingerly, "My Lord, I don't seem to have made any note at all."

"What?" barked his Lordship.

Gilbert Gray rose.

"My Lord, my learned junior is simply obeying my instructions. He is not to take any note until two hours have passed. By this time, as we know, the evidence is bound to be fresh to the memory."