A test of the constitution

It is not only Fleet Street tabloids that are chewing over the Paul Burrell story.

As Obiter discovered on a trip to New York, the US media is also fascinated by the butler's tales and the looming 'constitutional crisis'.

Television network NBC held a lengthy panel discussion on the Queen's intervention in the Burrell trial.

Panellists included Joshua Rozenberg of the Daily Telegraph and media law specialist lawyer Mark Stephens of London firm Finers Stephens Innocent.

Mr Stephens, no stranger to UK viewers, was billed as a 'British constitutional law expert' - which will only amuse a certain Angry Harry.

Harry has held forth on his Web site (www.angryharry.com) about the number of fields of expertise ascribed by others to the Stephens legal portfolio (see [2001] Gazette, 9 August, 14).

He may be even more bemused if 'residential conveyancing specialist' Mr Stephens is ever asked about the disposal of several large palaces once the crisis has caused the monarchy to fall.