Four leading Queen's Counsel have made an unprecedented defence of the judge accused by newspaper chiefs of singlehandedly creating a privacy law.

In a letter to The Times, the four top defamation silks reject claims that Mr Justice Eady is on a one-man mission to introduce a privacy law by the backdoor.

The attack, by Paul Dacre, Editor of the Daily Mail, and supported by The Sun, “cannot stand unanswered, not least because the judge is unable to respond publicly to such criticism”, they say.

The four QCs point out that Mr Justice Eady's rulings are subject to review by higher courts; insist that he was doing no more than applying the law; and rebut the notion that he wants to suppress media freedom of expression.

The letter is signed by Desmond Browne, QC (chairman-elect of the Bar Council), Adrienne Page, QC, Andrew Caldecott, QC, and Richard Rampton, QC, who between them have acted in most of the high-profile libel cases of recent years.

Mr Dacre accused Mr Justice Eady, the senior libel judge, of using human rights laws to curb the press's freedom to expose the moral shortcomings of those in high places. In an attack unusual for its vehemence against a named judge, Mr Dacre said that his “arrogant and amoral” judgments were “inexorably and insidiously” imposing a privacy law on British newspapers. Mr Dacre, who is Editor-in-Chief of Associated Newspapers, also denounced the “wretched” Human Rights Act in a speech to the Society of Editors' annual conference in Bristol.

Mr Justice Eady has presided over a series of high-profile newspaper cases, including this year's High Court action by Max Mosley, the president of the motor racing body, the FIA, against the News of the World.

Mr Dacre said that in supporting Mr Mosley, the judge had “effectively ruled that it was perfectly acceptable for the multi-millionaire head of a multibillion-sport followed by countless young people to pay five women £2,500 to take part in acts of unimaginable sexual depravity.

“Most people would consider such activities to be perverted, depraved, the very abrogation of civilised behaviour of which the law is supposed to be the safeguard. Not Justice Eady. To him such behaviour was merely ‘unconventional'.”

What was most worrying, Mr Dacre said, was that the judge was ruling that on morality issues the law was “effectively neutral”, adding: “which is why I accuse him, in his judgments, of being 'amoral'.”

Mr Dacre was backed yesterday by News International, which owns The Sun and The Times. Its legal manager, Tom Crone, said: “Through a series of privacy cases it has become clear to us that the courts no longer take moral considerations into account when framing judgments. These judgments risk outlawing the traditional role of the media in exposing the moral shortcomings of those who wield power. This is an unhealthy development in any democracy.”

Graham Dudman, managing editor of The Sun, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: “The issue here is that [Mr] Justice Eady is unelected and unaccountable. Parliament has not made these decisions, one man has.”

However, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, a former Lord Chancellor and one of the architects of the Human Rights Act 1998, said: “The judge is unquestionably applying the law as it comes from Parliament, as interpreted by the senior courts, the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords.

“Do we want things that are legitimately private to be made public? I don't think we do.”

A line-up of leading human rights and media lawyers have added their voices in the defence of Mr Justice Eady.

Lord Pannick QC, a leading human rights, public law and media barrister, said that the judge’s job was to “interpret the legislation enacted by Parliament, including the Human Rights Act, without fear or favour".

Lord Pannick added: “I am sure that he will continue to do so without fear of ill-informed comments by newspaper editors who favour journalists being immune from the right to privacy protected by that Act.”

Mr Dacre’s “ extraordinary attack” ignored that many newspapers opposed parts of the Human Rights Act precisely because they knew that it would provide legal protection for privacy, he added. "If newspapers think that any of Mr Justice Eady's judgments are wrong in law, they are of course entitled to appeal."

Ronald Thwaites, QC, a media silk, said: “As usual, with certain organs of the press, they hand-pick the facts that suit them, select a convenient hate-figure and attach to him all their woes about the privacy law.”

He added: "But it’s a pity that Paul Dacre couldn’t get his facts right before making a personal attack on judge who is not permitted to defend himself. Mr Justice Eady has not had ‘a virtual monopoly’ on privacy cases and was not, for example involved in three of the main cases that contributed to the development of the privacy law, namely, Naomi Campbell, JK Rowling’s child or the Prince of Wales.”

Dan Tench, media partner with Olswang, the London solicitors, said it was “ridiculous” to blame the judge for the development of privacy law. That had been done by a number of judges including the House of Lords and European Court of Human Rights.

“It is not his doing at all. The idea that he is on a frolic of his own is absolute nonsense.”

He reiterated that Mr Justice Eady was not the only judge involved in deciding some of the leading privacy cases: Mr Justice Patten, for instance, had ruled in the JK Rowling case.

But as the judge in charge of the libel lists, he was likely to deal with many of the high-profile cases that came before the courts, he added.

Mr Tench added that if judges did not decide such cases, it was uncertain who would. To bring in juries would greatly increase costs of such cases, which the press might not welcome; and the Press Complaints Commission would not command public confidence in defending privacy rights.

"The test is simply: is it private information that is in the public interest to know? Judges make decisions like this on the facts every day in the courts and in all areas of law."

Rod Dadak, partner and head of defamation at Lewis Silkin, also said that Mr Dacre's attack revealed a "serious lack of analysis by Mr Dacre".

The article in the News of the World was "far from being quality journalism and exposing something that was of considerable public interest", he said. "It was nothing of the sort."

Mr Dadak added: "To try to blame a High Court judge for decisions which Mr Dacre wrongly attributes to the judge's improper or ubiquitous approach does a great disservice and is misconceived.

"It is essential that we preserve freedom of expression, but it is also essential that we preserve privacy. It is a balancing exercise and the inflexibilty of Parliament-made law will certainly not improve matters - rather it will worsen them and will in effect shackle the press more than they are constrained at the moment."

Sarah Webb, media partner with Russell Jones & Walker, said that from her knowledge of the judge, he was the last person to be accused of being "amoral" in his judgments.

"Paul Dacre completely ignores the fact that it was David Eady found in favour of Associated Newspapers in the cae brought by Lord Browne for privacy and that Lord Browne lost that case because he misled the court, a matter on which the judge took a high moral stance."

She added it was "ridiculous" for newspapers to say, as the managing editor of The Sun had on BBC radio, that appeals were costly. "If they were successful they would recover their costs."

The real reason for a failure of the News of the World to appeal over Mr Justice Eady's Max Mosley's ruling was that it knew that the Court of Appeal was likely to uphold the judge's decision, she said, as it had done in the case of Loreena McKennitt and Niema Ash.

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