OPINION: The lawyer who fought for free speech as resolutely as any journalist

Anyone who has worked on a newspaper or magazine will be familiar with the concept of the media lawyer. Even community journals, like this newspaper, funded with the assistance of charitable money, can find themselves in the cross hairs. Britain’s onerous libel lawyers and chippy, litigious critics can threaten the very existence of the free press.

Most of us have experienced disquiet when a carefully-researched article, banging wrongs to rights, is returned to an editor or journalist with a blue pen through much of the transcript making publication all but impossible.

Instead of regarding the ‘legal’ department or outside advisers as allies, reporters at times see the lawyers as a menace.

Eddie Young , the Daily Mail’s former senior legal adviser who died on 17 November aged 80, was the antithesis of this. He set about making the Associated Newspapers legal department an extension of the newspapers he represented. Initially Young worked on the Evening Standard and later the Mail titles. His ‘can-do’ attitude still drives the Mail’s legal department.

Young’s leadership meant the philosophy of his team was to get material into the paper, however, controversial. He would take the fight to the courts and confront the establishment pomposity of the judges, in the name  of ‘freedom of the press’, even for the most obscure cause.

His former colleagues, such as The Sun’s chief legal officer, Adam Cannon, (board member and informal adviser to Jewish News) have spread across Fleet Street, helping to make it a more fearless place.

A looming six foot, three inches tall and athletic in build, Young cut a formidable figure. His greatest claim to fame was his close collaboration with Daily Mail editor-in-chief Paul Dacre.

He was instrumental in bringing one of the most famous headlines of the late 20th century ‘murderers’ – accusing five suspects of the racially-motived killing of Stephen Lawrence in south-east London – of a crime of which they had already been acquitted. It was a turning point for justice, eventually leading to the Macpherson Report which exposed institutional racism in the Metropolitan Police.

More privately, Eddie had another great passion. Although he prided himself on editorial independence, he was a fierce supporter of Israel. Scrolling through my emails after his death, I found several tart critiques of articles that had appeared in the Mail, which he found derogatory of Israel.

Eddie Young would take the fight to the courts and confront the establishment pomposity of the judges, in the name of ‘freedom of the press’, even for the most obscure cause.

He was particularly critical of one columnist whose views (I later discovered) had been fortified by a family member’s senior British army background and the death toll at the King David Hotel explosion in 1946.

The strong views of the two colleagues would never be reconciled. Occasionally (because he refused to directly engage in editorial policy), Young sought to use me as a conduit to Mr Dacre on Middle East reporting.

Born to a large Roman Catholic family and educated at St Benedict’s school in Ealing, and University College London, Young converted to Judaism after meeting his wife Diana.

The family lived in north London, where Young developed a wide circle of Jewish and Israeli friends. He later set up home in Herzliya, where he spent holidays and many of his later years. He is survived by his children, Danielle (who lives in Israel), Nadine and Ilan.

Young, the strapping captain of his school’s cricket team and regular member of the rugby XV (where he played alongside Chris Patten), would have looked down at the shiva in the family home in Finchley with pride.

Ilan took control, reading every word of the Ma’ariv service in a beautifully lilted, modern Hebrew. Eddie may have been born Catholic, but he died a robust Jew, proud of his identity and as fearless a defender of Israel as he was of a free press.

He has a vibrant legacy as part of the golden chain of Judaism.