Leveson press conference sketch: the supreme authority of the Lord

The conference platform was surrounded by screens tinted a deep and easeful blue. At just after 1.30 pm, Lord Leveson ambled forth, sporting a white shirt, a grey suit and a slight stoop. He peered out at the assembled pack of journalists from beneath his curmudgeonly black eyebrows. Then he sat at his desk. Microphones at either end bowed towards him like praying mantises. He began to speak. His quiet voice and his dense, circuitous prose suggest that he’s used to being listened to in awed silence. So he was. Occasionally he slowed the pace and upped the volume suddenly. A court-room device, perhaps, to jog a dozy juror awake.

‘The press, operating freely,’ he intoned, ‘is one of the true safeguards of our democracy.’ As his speech unfolded it became clear he was offering caution and conciliation. He hadn’t come to hurl grenades or to slay reputations. Still less was he intent on setting one tribe off against another.