BBC's Andrew Marr 'embarrassed' by super-injunction
Former political editor Andrew Marr said he was "embarrassed" and "uneasy" about the injunctionBBC presenter Andrew Marr has revealed he took out a super-injunction to protect his family's privacy - but says he will not pursue it any further.
In an interview with the Daily Mail, Mr Marr said he was "embarrassed" about the gagging order he took out in January 2008 to suppress reports of an affair with a fellow journalist.
"I did not come into journalism to go around gagging journalists," he said.
The use of injunctions seemed to be "running out of control," he added.
Mr Marr's comments follow a number of recent injunctions which have banned the identification of celebrities.
In the Mail newspaper, Mr Marr - who hosts a Sunday politics show on BBC One - confirmed he had taken out an injunction to prevent details about the affair, which happened eight years ago, from being published.
He said: "Am I embarrassed by it? Yes. Am I uneasy about it? Yes."
'Sense of proportion'But he added: "I also had my own family to think about, and I believed this story was nobody else's business."
Mr Marr went on to say he knew injunctions were "controversial, and the situation seems to be running out of control".
"There is a case for privacy in a limited number of difficult situations, but then you have to move on. They shouldn't be forever and a proper sense of proportion is required," he said.
Last week, Prime Minister David Cameron said he felt "uneasy" about judges granting injunctions to protect the privacy of powerful individuals.
He warned that judges were using human rights legislation "to deliver a sort of privacy law" and argued that Parliament, not judges, should decide on the balance between press freedom and privacy.
Last Wednesday, High Court judge Mr Justice Eady agreed to issue a "contra mundum" order - effectively a worldwide ban - in the case of a man who sought to prevent publication of material about his private life.
Such orders were previously used to stop the publication of details about the killers of James Bulger, when a court ruled that there was a "strong possibility" that their lives would be at risk if they were identified.
A contra mundum order is intended to apply forever, and applies to everyone - as opposed to forbidding the publication of details by a specific newspaper or journalist.
In a separate case, a married Premier League footballer who reportedly had an affair with Big Brother's Imogen Thomas, won the right to continue his anonymity.
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