The publication of Sally and Steve Clark's book on her wrongful conviction for murdering their two baby sons, 'Stolen Innocence: A Mother's Fight for Justice', received widespread coverage last week.

The Times, which serialised the book, reported on how 'the once-confident solicitor can no longer bear to be in crowds, nor risk going alone to pick up Tom, 5, from school'.

It quotes Mrs Clark from the book saying: 'I have been so damaged by what happened.

I am a different person.

I can't cope.

Things have got worse, not better.'

Mr Clark, who gave an interview to the Times to coincide with the book's release, acknowledged that, on the basis of the original medical evidence, if 'I were a copper or a CPS lawyer I would have thought, "OK, we have got to do this".

'But when it all fell apart, you just wonder why they pursued it.

Were they worried that we were lawyers and we were going to sue them? We were up against the full power of the state, and yet they would not listen to reason.'

The couple will not receive any money for the book or the interview.

In an editorial, the Times said: 'Too ill to speak publicly, her [Mrs Clark's] tale has been told through a friend, a lawyer (John Batt) whose faith in the justice system, like that of the Clarks, has been shattered by what he witnessed.'

It continued: 'Just one case like Mrs Clark's is too many.

It is a story of a couple fighting an unstoppable "process", from the police to social services to the criminal and family courts, to the final indignity of a dispute with the government over appeal costs.'

The Daily Telegraph (10 June), meanwhile, reported in its law and media section on a battle of a different kind - with journalist Toby Harnden writing about his five-year legal battle with Lord Saville, who had tried to force him to identify his sources as part of the Bloody Sunday inquiry and who at one stage applied for him to be held in contempt of the tribunal.

The paper went on to set out how Lord Saville's inquiry had made legal history, focusing on the rising expense and the fees paid to lawyers.

Unsurprisingly, given this background, a Telegraph editorial railed against Lord Saville's decision to pursue Mr Harnden.

'Was this a proper use of his powers, or indeed of taxpayers' money?' it asked, before going on to criticise the cost of the inquiry as a whole.

'The only beneficiaries are the lawyers - and, of course, the terrorists.'

On the same day (10 June), the Daily Mail reported on a plan to appoint more black judges being considered by the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer.

'It [the plan] recommends a system for picking judges and magistrates that would effectively use quotas.

The aim is to get more ethnic minority and women lawyers on the bench,' the paper said.

'It marks the first time that the idea of appointing judges on race grounds has been openly canvassed in Whitehall,' it continued, adding that the move was part of attempts to 'establish a more "representative" judiciary'.

The Mail also claimed that the report calls for 2 million a year to be spent on new equality programmes at the Department for Constitutional Affairs.

The idea was given short shrift by the shadow constitutional affairs secretary, Alan Duncan, who told the paper: 'This really is sanctimonious, nauseating nonsense from this government.

Their top priority should be fair and efficient justice, instead of all this patronising political correctness.'

So there will be no cross-party political consensus on this particular initiative, then.

Philip Hoult