This was nothing less than a conspiracy to destroy the Daily Mail. Thankfully a judge had the good sense to reject it – but the enemies of a free Press won’t go away: STEPHEN GLOVER

Readers of e-mail headlines and the journalists who work for them have cause for great celebration following Mr Justice Nicklin’s decision in the Supreme Court yesterday.

All allegations against the Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday – including the highly damaging allegations made in Prince Harry’s publicity spotlight – have been denied. There was no warning. There are no exceptions. This was a victory for both newspapers and journalists.

The lawsuit against Associated Newspapers, publisher of the two titles, was nothing more than a conspiracy to put the newspapers at the altar of public opinion and, if possible, shut them down.

Therefore, the 436-page written decision is also a victory for the right of all free press and newspapers to report on the goings on of the rich and powerful, as long as it is within the law.

Those who challenge this right, as well as those who bend the rules or indulge in illegality, will sleep a little less comfortably in their beds because of what happened yesterday.

Print media as a whole has experienced declining circulation over the past two decades, and some publications have struggled to adapt to the digital age. This decision will provide a very welcome boost to every newspaper and all the journalists working for them.

But although victory was beyond doubt, no one should think that it was easily achieved. First of all, the cost of the case was enormous for both parties; That’s more than £50 million, of which Associated Newspapers has paid more than half so far. The judge has not yet ruled on costs.

No less serious was the stress the case put on nearly everyone who worked for Associated. Especially under this law, there were more than 40 journalists who had to answer for themselves in court.

Mr Justice Nicklin singled out a number of Mail journalists for being ‘honest’ and ‘impressive’ witnesses

It is certainly pleasing that Mr Justice Nicklin was impressed by the honesty of these witnesses, some of whom he singled out during the 11-week trial as ‘honest’ and ‘impressive’. This was a tribute to the quality of journalists who have worked and still work for the Mail newspapers.

On the contrary, among the seven plaintiffs, the Judge found that while the individual plaintiffs were honest, there was limited direct evidence to support the allegations. Only one witness, Sir Elton John’s husband David Furnish, was seen as impressive.

In fact, after the plaintiffs’ key witness, former private investigator Gavin Burrows, retracted his earlier testimony, they were left with no credible evidence and began making false claims.

But the scarcity of evidence did not assuage the concerns of many Mail journalists. They were falsely accused of career-damaging activities. Reputation was at stake.

The journalist with the most to lose and whose significant achievements were questioned was Paul Dacre, editor of the Mail from 1992 to 2018.

Mr Dacre, among others, was accused by the plaintiffs of lying to the Leveson Inquiry in 2012 by stating that the Mail companies had never been involved in phone hacking. The judge found no truth in these false allegations.

Perhaps more painful for Mr Dacre were the accusations from Doreen Lawrence, whose son Stephen was killed by thugs in south London in 1993. Almost four years later, after police efforts to charge criminals failed, the Mail published its famous front page with a single headline: ‘Murderers’.

Most political circles and a few newspapers were quick to criticize the Mail, but legendary former Rolls Master Lord Denning described it as ‘a great work of journalism’.

Former F1 president Max Mosely also tried to damage the Mail after it was revealed that he was the publisher of a racist election leaflet used by his father Oswald.

Baroness Doreen Lawrence with friend and lawyer Imran Khan outside the Supreme Court

Former Liberal Democrat MP Dr Evan Harris pictured outside court during hearing

It was a measure of Denning’s greatness that the Mail was able to grasp that he was fighting for truth and justice by standing behind a murdered black teenager whose underprivileged parents had been abandoned by the police and prosecution authorities.

It was therefore a bitter pill to hear that Baroness Lawrence joined the plaintiffs in accusing the Mail of targeting her with illegal doxxing techniques, for reasons that remain unclear. These claims were completely rejected by the judge.

All this shows that many Mail journalists, past and present, live under excruciating pressure as they are subjected to unsubstantiated as well as potentially devastating allegations.

These claims did not emerge from a clear blue sky; That’s why I can easily talk about a conspiracy. Some people consciously set out to damage and preferably destroy Mail.

One of these was press-hater Max Mosley, who famously won a 2008 libel case against the now-defunct News of the World, which accused him of holding a ‘Nazi-themed orgy’. They were right about the orgy with bloodshed, but they couldn’t prove the Nazi part.

In 2018 the Mail managed to prove that Mosley was the publisher of a terrible racist election leaflet used by his father, the fascist Oswald Mosley, in 1961. This revelation only increased Mosley’s determination to damage the Mail.

He had terminal cancer and shot himself in May 2021, but not before using some of his enormous fortune (much of it inherited from his obnoxious father) to benefit the Hacked Off group, which campaigns for state control of the press.

One of the beneficiaries was Graham Johnson, to whom Mosley gave at least £565,000, some of which was used to pay witnesses against the Mail. Another was Professor Brian Cathcart, a founding member of Hacked Off who received generous funding from Mosley to write a book.

The exact role of Hacked Off in the campaign to bring down the Mail is left for another day. One of those who gave evidence on behalf of the plaintiffs was former Liberal Democrat MP Dr. Suffice it to say that Evan Harris was once the group’s executive director. The judge described him as ‘particularly prone to restructuring’.

The Daily Mail triumphantly fended off its enemies in this case, but no one should think that they will ever escape the battlefield without causing trouble again.

Prince Harry, who has waged a seven-year war against the press and is credited with winning against publishers of the Sun and the Daily Mirror, now looks likely to give up, although he showed remarkable discourtesy yesterday by describing the decision as a ‘blatant whitewash’.

But Hacked Off and sympathetic voices in Labor seats will not stop calling for a so-called ‘Leveson Chapter Two’, the aim of which they hope will be to restrict the free press and establish some form of state control.

In fact, Hacked Off responded to yesterday’s decision by calling for a public inquiry. Under these circumstances this requires some brass head. No matter how disreputable the organization and its cause are, they will not give up.

Therefore, vigilance should be our watchword. The battle for a free press has been won once and for all, but the war will never end. There will be other wealthy opportunists like Max Mosley who will want to silence the press, and more celebrities who will make false accusations.

But for now, let us be grateful to Mr Justice Nicklin for his good sense and congratulate the journalists of this newspaper for holding the line in such trying circumstances. I am proud to be their colleague.