THE recommendations of the Leveson report seem to be running into the sand, good; it was a dreadful over reaction to the excesses of the press.

Sure some newspapers sinned when they hacked phones and for that they have paid a heavy price, one has paper disappeared altogether, journalists have been put in prison and companies have been fined millions of pounds. That is more than enough punishment; a free society will struggle without a free, independent and vigorous newspaper industry. Would the MPs expenses scandal been uncovered if it hadn’t been for noisy newspapers? I doubt it.

The police who continue to hound journalists, the CPS should back off from their attempts to prosecute journalists. Their prosecutions have often led to expensive failures and their actions against journalists have become something you would expect in a police state not in an open and free democracy.

If has become fashionable to knock the press and to restrict their activities, I worry about the future of our democracy if they are gagged and cowed either by the Leveson report or for that matter by Islamic extremism.

We should be proud of our local and national newspapers, their diversity, their fearlessness and their independence. They are a national institution and we should cherish them.

Cllr Martyn Cox

Westhoughton North and Chew Moor