The Government is suppressing official advice over the legality of new rules to regulate the press, The Telegraph can disclose.
Ministers are refusing to disclose the contents of a key document on the Royal Charter, a new system of regulation which critics say risks granting politicians control over the press for the first time in 300 years.
The paper is thought to set out advice on whether the plans breach European law. Four QCs have said the scheme, which was drawn up based on Lord Justice Leveson’s report on press regulation, violates the clause concerning freedom of expression in the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).