Heather Brooke: Get rid of these paternalistic laws

It is no surprise that the US public was the first to see photographs of the bombed Tube

Now that the suspected terrorists have been captured, the media moves into murky territory about what it can tell the public. The police are in a difficult position. They know the public wants information but, as an officer involved in the investigation said: "We are having to be particularly careful about what we say because they [the suspects] have now been arrested. We are worried about the contempt laws."

Trials of terrorism charges almost always start with complaints that pre-trial media coverage will inherently prevent a fair trial. Inevitably, some judges have expressed disapproval of the press, and the Metropolitan Police Authority has asked Sir Ian Blair if he would condemn the media coverage. The head of the civil rights group Liberty has demanded that the Attorney General clamp down on the media to prevent future contempt of court.

Lost in all this criticism of the media is the right of the public to be kept informed. Like most Londoners, I have listened to weeks of sirens screaming by my flat. Last Thursday, I found myself confronted by 20 police officers as I entered Tottenham Court Road Tube station. I've seen armed police in London and wonder about the details of their new "shoot-to-kill policy". The police are certainly not telling me what's happening, so I, like every other citizen in this pseudo-democracy, get my information from the media. The media in turn get it from us, as the police aren't telling them much either.

That the police and judges want to stifle this one lifeline to information shows the extent to which the UK's paternalistic Contempt of Court law is out of step with democratic times.

It is all very well saying the police need some room to manoeuvre, but the information lockdown operating at all times, not just during the present crisis, among the police and judiciary, makes a mockery of open justice. It is no surprise that we know more about the Italian bombing suspect than any other part of the terrorist investigation. Or that the American public was the first to see photographs of the bombed Tube carriages. These countries are free from such stifling contempt of court laws.

The contempt of court laws prohibit the publication of any information that could be judged to seriously impede or prejudice judicial proceedings while those proceedings are active. They also prevent publication of a suspect's background or previous convictions. This gag on freedom of expression is bad for several reasons. Firstly, it assumes that juries (and by default the public) are incapable of rational thought once exposed to the media. Such a patronising attitude is clear when you consider that this type of contempt only refers to trial by jury: a judge is deemed sufficiently intelligent to discount media coverage.

No one doubts the right of a defendant to have a fair trial, but it must be balanced against the law-abiding public's right to be kept informed and the victim's right to justice. The UK judicial system has swung too far in protecting the rights of the accused at the expense of everyone else, and this imbalance has led to increasingly reactionary laws coming through Parliament that strip everyone of their civil liberties.

There are a lot more threats to civil liberties in this country than excess information, so it baffles me why Liberty is willing to trample all over freedom of speech, freedom of the press and the public's right to know.

The director of Liberty, Shami Chakrabarti, has written to the Attorney General asking him to issue an informal warning to the media to prevent future contempt, stating there is "a real danger that the constant association of these faces with commentary relating to criminal charges ... would help foster an assumption of guilt in the fairest of juror".

On what facts does Chakrabarti base this assumption? The answer is simple - none. Almost no research has been done in the UK on juries, how they reach their decisions and their courtroom experiences. Where empirical studies have been done - in the US and New Zealand for instance, where there are no such contempt of court laws - the evidence is overwhelming and all points in one direction: media exposure has no effect on a juror's decision and, in fact, jurors are remarkably able to put aside what they have seen or heard about a case. Even the most publicised cases in the US have more often led to acquittals than to convictions.

It is time to acknowledge that the contempt of court laws in this country produce far more harm than good. They are based on inherently paternalistic and unproven perceptions that show a remarkable lack of respect for the public.

The writer is the author of 'Your Right to Know' ( www.yrtk.org)