McCann To Tell Inquiry Of Media Intrusion

The father of missing Madeleine McCann will reveal how incessant press attention affected his family's life when he appears before the inquiry into media ethics later.

Gerry McCann's testimony is certain to be among the most moving the Leveson Inquiry will hear.

The abduction of Madeleine on a family holiday in Portugal and the suspicion surrounding Gerry and her mother Kate led to a barrage of highly personal media reports.

The inquiry, now in its third day, will also hear from Mark Lewis, the lawyer representing the family of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.

Mr Lewis previously negotiated a total of £3m from Rupert Murdoch and News International in compensation for the hacking of Milly's phone.

He also represented Gordon Taylor, former boss of the Professional Footballers' Association, winning him a £425,000 settlement from News International as the first phone hacking claimant.

In recent week, it has been revealed that Mr Lewis was followed by the News Of The World and his ex-wife and daughter were put under surveillance by a private detective working for the paper.

Mr Lewis also believes his phone was hacked.

The inquiry will also take evidence from the former wife of England football star Paul Gascoigne, Sheryl.

Her often troubled relationship with Gascoigne provided the tabloid press with a gold mine of highly personal stories.

Ms Gascoigne's testimony is likely to shed even more light on the dark arts employed by the more unscrupulous extremes of the media in order to dredge up dirt on their targets.

On Tuesday, comedian Steve Coogan likened some parts of the press to the Mafia, saying the underhand methods they use were "just business".

He described how the News Of The World rang him about a story it intended to publish involving an affair he had been having, offering to leave out some of the more "lurid" and "embarrassing" details if he confirmed the story.

The Alan Partridge creator did, only to be told that the entire conversation had been recorded and all the details would be published in the paper, which they were.

As he finished his evidence, Coogan said: "There needs to be a privacy law so that genuine public interest journalism is not besmirched by this tawdry muck-raking."