PCC deal to remove Middleton pics from Mail +2 papers

Once more it seems the PCC can act to protect the most privileged. Even so, will it still be too little too late for the PCC, or will they still have a future once the reviews into media regulation are completed?

Article from the always-readable Roy Greenslade.

Three papers remove Middleton pictures from their websites

Press Complaints Commission brokers deal on behalf of Duchess of Cambridge's family

Pippa and Carole Middleton

Three national newspapers have removed pictures of the Duchess of Cambridge's family (the Middletons) from their websites.
The Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and Daily Mirror agreed to take down the images and never to republish them as part of a deal negotiated by the Press Complaints Commission.
The pictures of the Middletons and Prince William, aboard a boat moored off the island of Ibiza, had been taken five years before the papers published them in May.
Seven photographs appeared in the Mail on Sunday under the headline "Perfect Pippa – and the Prince of Belly Flops". They showed Kate and Pippa Middleton, both wearing bikinis, while swimming, diving and sun-bathing. Their mother, Carole, was also shown in a bikini.
Several shots from the same set then appeared in the Daily Mail and the Mirror.
Carole Middleton complained – through the law firm Harbottle & Lewis – to the PCC in company with her daughter, Pippa, and son, James, that the images invaded their privacy.
They argued that the pictures were taken in 2006 in a place where the family had "a reasonable expectation of privacy" (and therefore breached the editors' code of practice).
They alleged that the photos were taken after their boat had been pursued.
Pippa Middleton made a third complaint about the publication of an image by the Daily Mirror showing her sunbathing on the boat.
In all cases the complainants argued that they had a reasonable expectation of privacy.
As expected, the three papers defended publication by saying that the images had been published on several occasions since 2006 and had not attracted complaint.
They also denied that the boat had been followed and further argued that the Middletons didn't have a reasonable expectation of privacy "at the location in which the boat was situated".
PS: The now-defunct News of the World also carried the pictures on its front page with the headline "Oh buoy it's Pippa... and she's topless inside". Its website has, of course, been taken down in its entirety.
I will post a comment on this later.
Source: PCC