British journalist, novelist and human-rights activist. Former chair of the Writers in Prison committee in the English section of International PEN and former Executive Director of Hacked Off. A Core Participant Victim, Smith gave evidence to the Inquiry of being told by her MP partner Denis MacShane that their phones had been hacked. The police confirmed that details of their conversations and meetings had been acquired by Glenn Mulcaire on behalf of the News of the World. She described the hacking as a sickening invasion of her privacy.
Chief Executive Officer of Object, a human-rights organisation set up to challenge the sexual objectification of women and girls in the media. Heeswijk argued that the Inquiry had a unique opportunity to put the hyper-sexualisation of women on the reform agenda.
Former Director of British Irish Rights Watch, an independent non-governmental human-rights organisation. At the time of the Inquiry, an active member of the Hacked Off campaign, after learning of the hacking of her emails while working with BIRW. She expressed her concerns to the Inquiry at the length of time the police might have known of this hacking before contacting her.
Lawyer, partner and Head of Media and Information Law at Bindmans LLP. Represented around 70 Core Participants in the Leveson Inquiry, including Hugh Grant, Jude Law, Charlotte Church and Gerry and Kate McCann. Specialises in defamation and privacy law, information and data protection law, copyright and human rights law.
Multi-language newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper covers general-interest topics, with a focus on news about China and human-rights issues there. Explicitly opposed to the Communist Party of China. Gave evidence to the Inquiry of attempts by China to prevent circulation and sales of Epoch Times in the UK.
Founded 1992. Equality Now is an international charity founded by lawyers Jessica Neuwirth, Navanethem Pillay and Reryal Gharahi. The charity acts to protect women's rights and fight against the discrimination of women and girls. Gave evidence with similar charities on recommendations for a new regime with respect to women's rights.
Formed in 2010. Grassroots campaign, run by volunteers, helping people serving mandatory life sentences for crimes committed by others. Helped support the cases of those who wanted to bring evidence of their poor treatment by the press.
Founded in 2003. Human rights organisation specifically set up to challenge the sexual objectification of women. Gave evidence jointly with Eaves, EVAW and Equality Now. Told the Inquiry that while many of the problems exposed seem deeply entrenched, these organisations believed it was possible to create a new and effective regulatory regime which was fair to all while preserving free speech.
Phillipson was Professor of Law at the University of Durham and a qualified solicitor at the time of giving evidence. His research interests were in public law, particularly areas of European and UK human rights law, he said. He offered evidence of the notion of "public interest" and noted that without adequate protection for privacy, there was the risk of a situation in which rights and freedoms of individuals were sacrificed to the commercial interests of the mass media and the idle curiosity of the majority.
British Barrister specialising in human rights, with a strong civil law background. Wagner founded the multi-award-winning human-rights charity Rights Info and the acclaimed UK Human Rights Blog. He spoke at the Inquiry of the “rough ethical system” emerging in respect to blogging and tweeting.
Solicitor. Former in-house lawyer within the Directorate of Legal Services at the Metropolitan Police, with expertise in public law, civil litigation, human rights and police law.
PEN is a global literary network, and English PEN the founding centre. It works to defend and promote freedom of expression, to remove barriers to literature, and to defend writers and readers when freedom of expression is at risk. Director Jonathan Heawood gave evidence on the public-interest law relating to the press.
