HUGH GRANT CHARGES PRIME MINISTER IN CAHOOTS WITH “PRESS BARONS”

Hugh Grant has accused British Prime Minister David Cameron of knuckling under to press barons and watering down the very mild regulations proposed by the Leveson Committee that looked into telephone hacking, police bribery and other alleged abuses by British newspapers in recent years. In a BBC radio interview, Grant, himself a telephone hacking victim, accused the current government of repeating the “same old story for the last 70 years which is our executive are basically in hock to big newspaper barons. They are terrified of the press.” Calling them a threat to freedom of the press, Britain’s leading newspaper publishers are opposing the current proposed press regulations and are threatening to boycott them. But Grant called the publishers’ reaction “propaganda.”