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Newspaper and magazine publishers have lodged an appeal against last week's high court ruling against granting them permission to seek a judicial review of the government's press regulation royal charter.
Publishers have taken their case to the court of appeal after Lord Justice Richards and Justice Sales ruled against an application for a judicial review of the privy council's rejection of the industry's rival plan for a new press regulator. An application for an injunction to prevent the government's charter getting the royal seal of approval was also dismissed.
The government charter was sealed by the Queen at Buckingham Palace on the same day, last Wednesday, in the presence of ministers at a privy council meeting.
The judicial review has the backing of four trade organisations representing newspapers and magazines – the Newspaper Publishers Association, the Newspaper Society, the Scottish Newspaper Society and the Professional Publishers Association – and was applied for through the Press Standards Board of Finance (PresBof), the funding body for the existing industry regulator, the PCC. PresBof made the industry's original royal charter application.
Lord Black of Brentwood, chairman of PresBof, said: "The imposition by the privy council of a royal charter on our industry raises hugely significant questions about a free press, a free society and the quality of our democracy. Quite apart from the threat to press freedom in the UK, it will have terrible reverberations across the Commonwealth and the developing world. The stakes are extremely high.
"We do not believe that a hastily convened [high court] hearing for an emergency injunction application is an appropriate venue for giving proper consideration to these vital issues. We are confident our appeal will succeed."
Newspaper and magazine publishers are pressing ahead with setting up their own new regulator, the Independent Press Standards Organisation (Ipso), which would include a contract binding publishers to the watchdog's decisions. They have said the new watchdog would have greater powers of investigation, enforcement and sanction than the discredited Press Complaints Commission, which it will replace.
Those supporting the judicial review and the creation of Ipso include the publishers of the Daily Mail, the Telegraph, the Mirror and Rupert Murdoch's News UK, publisher of the Sun and the Times.
Some newspapers have taken a neutral position on the legal challenge and have not yet signed up for Ipso. The Guardian is part of the NPA, in common with all other national newspapers, but is neither supporting nor rejecting the legal challenge.
The publishers of the Guardian, Independent and Financial Times, although opposed to the government's use of a royal charter as the so-called statutory underpinning for the new regulator, have not so far signed up for Ipso.
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