PROPOSALS to gag the freedom of the press, as laid out by the so-called Expert Group on the Leveson Report in Scotland, shame the nation.

For a country facing its most important political decision in 300 years, any move to hobble the democratic process by limiting the effectiveness of newspapers to do their jobs is both disgraceful and unacceptable.

The suggestions of the group, working to strict terms laid out by the Scottish Government, would enforce some of the most draconian press controls in the western world at a time when there has never been a greater need to challenge robustly the politicians and would-be powerbrokers of our nation.

There is more than a little irony in the fact that the Scottish Press and, in particular local newspapers, would be the worst-affected group in the whole of Britain, paying a price both financially and in their effectiveness, for the sins of those working on some English tabloids.

Having worked for 22 years on the Evening Times, and for a further 13 years in local newspapers such as the East Kilbride News, Wishaw Press and Airdrie and Coatbridge Advertiser, I have never been aware of any member of staff on any of those publications behaving in the reprehensible manner exposed by Leveson.

The vast majority of journalists would say the same. Indeed, had I known of such practices I would have long ago left the industry I so love.

Yet it is those same titles, newspapers which provide what is often the only scrutiny of local government in particular, which will find themselves fighting for their very survival as they are both swamped by the proposed imposition of demanding regulation and the cost of fighting nonsensical legal cases.

The real losers will be the Scottish people who, like me, rightly want to see the bad behaviour of small elements of the Press punished, but who will instead see those in the wider society who behave badly, or whose behaviour is far from being in the public interest, escaping proper scrutiny because intimidated editors either shy away from post-Leveson trouble, or who find their papers forced out of business by the costs of introducing the new regulator and the legal costs of fighting the inevitable spurious complaints which will accompany such a process.

The winners in this will be the lawyers who stand to cash-in, the unscrupulous politicians who will no longer have their actions and decisions questioned and challenged as robustly as at present and those other unsavoury individuals and organisations who prefer their wrongdoings not to have a light shone on them.

Far from offering the salvation suggested, these proposals instead lead in a different, hellish direction where wrongdoing is accepted without question because of the cowed and financially crippled Press which will result if the 'Expert Group' has its way.

This is not about fighting the shameful excesses of minute sections of the Press, something which all right-thinking people agree with, this is about fighting for the rights of every Scotsman, woman and child to have every part of society challenged by the Press when they do wrong and championed when they succeed. This is a fight for the heart and soul of Scotland and the Scottish Government must step back from the brink and ensure these shameful proposals never come to pass.

Tony Carlin Evening Times Editor