Showboating by MP about the NI review of the press

Recently in the House of Commons when members were debating a motion to hold a second part of the Leveson Inquiry set up to examine the ethics of the newspaper industry, Culture secretary Matt Hancock intimated that, '˜We propose to have a named person review the standards of the press in Northern Ireland.'

A showboating Ian Paisley MP asked, ‘Would it be fair for me to characterise that review as a Leveson for Northern Ireland?’

Given that Northern Ireland newspaper editors and police chiefs had testified before the inquiry and the integrity of the press was acknowledged, what was the point of Paisley’s superfluous question?

Would it be fair to characterise the person appointed to review the standards of the press in Northern Ireland as someone who will rap the knuckles of a press that had the audacity to expose the fiasco of a Renewable Heat Incentive or members of Parliament on expensive paid junkets to foreign shores.

Is this what Ian Paisley had in mind when he posed his inane question?

Wilson Burgess, Londonderry