Hacked-off Harry fighting for all of us to ‘read all about it’

Oceans of ink have been drained in trying to explain what Prince Harry hopes to achieve in the quietly spectacular drama currently being played out in Court 76 of the Royal Courts of Justice.

- ALAN RUSBRIDGER

Is it about revenge, justice, grievance, truth, vindication? Belated retribution for what his mother had to put up with at the hands of tabloid journalists? A chivalrous attempt to protect his wife, Meghan, and his own children from suffering the same fate?

Whatever the motive - and whatever the truth of his claims against Associated Newspapers - there is something almost recklessly heroic in his dogged determination to obtain some form of accountability for a generation of Wild West lawlessness in Fleet Street.

His targets also know a thing or two about revenge. And, like Donald Trump, they have long memories.

In a way, Harry is single-handedly doing what the second part of the Leveson Inquiry into press behaviour and ethics was never allowed to do. He has already humbled some of the biggest beasts in the Murdoch and Mirror empires. Now he has his sights on the Mail titles - and the stakes, both financial and reputational, are enormous.

Do you remember Matt Hancock, the perky little health secretary who was so out of his depth when he found himself having to respond to the greatest health crisis of our times?

You will doubtless have forgotten that he had previously served briefly as culture secretary. In that role, he quietly shelved the promised Leveson 2, which had been due to look into broader illegality in Fleet Street.

Editors and proprietors broke open the champagne and, in time, showed their appreciation by publishing CCTV footage of Hancock and his “adviser”, Gina Coladangelo, treating his own Covid social distancing rules with uninhibited abandon. Some gratitude!