Letter: Press regulation: a Bill killed, tragic revelations, the global village, sellers of sleaze

Sir: Your article 'A rude, sometimes nasty, but essential watchdog' (12 January) makes a noble defence of the press as a purveyor of important news and serious political criticism. This may well be true of certain sections of the press, including your newspaper, but there is another section which contains no important news or serious political criticism, and which one of its proprietors once described as a branch of the entertainment industry.

Freedom of the press is one thing, freedom of the entertainment industry is another, particularly when the entertainment provided is mostly sleaze, soft porn or invasions of privacy. I know of no sacred principle which justifies total liberty for that kind of thing.

Yours faithfully,

WILLIAM HAYTER

Stanton St John, Oxfordshire