Prince Harry takes on British tabloids in historic court case

Even without going into the devious ways that the tabloid press pried and snooped throughout Harry's lifetime, there ought to be a third inquiry, supplementary to a second one chaired by Lord Justice Leveson, into the whole business of bad puns.

Was the title of Harry's book itself a play on words? The phrase 'going spare' may be lurking behind it.

If so, one could hardly blame him, after the continuous exposure he's had to this pervasive punditry. Though the tabloid hacks may like to think of themselves as comedians, they just won't stand-up in a court of law.

Harry's creditable job in court

It's not every day that members of Britain's royal family testify in a court of law. In fact, it hasn't happened in over a hundred years. Most of the commentators have admitted that Harry did a creditable job of it.

In the course of a gruelling eight hours or so over two days, he has held his own against one of the big beasts of the silky profession. Green asked him at one point if he would be glad if it turned out that he'd had his phone hacked. What kind of sly question was that?

The back story to all this has loomed large, however, overshadowing the minor drama of cross-examination. It was there already in Harry's lengthy and eloquent witness statement.

This is a disease of the body politic he's addressing: the power without accountability of a press that exploits free speech and the liberties it affords, to prey on celebrities, yes, but also on members of the public who have the ill fortune to arouse its ire.

The statement is a damning verdict on the decline of the country. No wonder, then, it has attracted so much criticism, when verdicts like this are regularly dismissed as 'woke'.

The duke describes (with remarkable self-deprecation) the way he played up to the characterisation he received. He had to be the playboy prince, the failure, the dropout or, "in my case, the 'thicko', the 'cheat', the 'underage drinker', the 'irresponsible drug taker', the list goes on."

So far, this seems like familiar territory. It's hard to think of anyone who has explored their personal grief in public with greater thoroughness than Harry.

A bold accusation...even historic

But there's more to it than that:

"...at the moment, our country is judged globally by the state of our press and our government, both of which I believe are at rock bottom. Democracy fails when your press fails to scrutinise and hold the government accountable, and instead chooses to get into bed with them so they can ensure the status quo," Harry said.

A government at rock bottom? This is truly historic, I think, as we are not accustomed to hearing members of the royal family opine on the state of the government. According to protocol, it's just not the done thing.

To hear this from a man whose grandmother never, in her long reign, knowingly let on about her political views, and whose father has had to rein in his own since replacing her, feels like a departure from royal status more profound than merely moving to the United States.

It's as if the old Etonian, now an honorary American (though not entirely honoured; a court case has just begun that challenges the validity of his visa, given his revelations about drug taking) has gotten far enough away to start calling pavements sidewalks and the crown an imperial institution:

'I may not have a role within the Institution but, as a member of the British Royal family, and as a soldier upholding important values, I feel there's a responsibility to expose this criminal activity in the name of public interest.'

The criminals he seeks to expose are the ones that did the hacking and the blagging in order to make his life hell. That's also the aim of the hundred or so claimants against the Mirror Group.

But Harry's is a far more ambitious programme than that. Someone said he wanted to change the landscape of the media entirely. Right, and that's ambitious enough.

Nevertheless, the ambition is even greater for Harry. It goes all the way to resolving the age-old problem of successive governments controlled by the newspapers, whose editors are controlled in turn by rich owners with reactionary agendas.

It goes all the way, in fact, to transforming an old country with a guilty fondness for bad puns.