The Media Bill’s third reading is in washup in the Lords today. Speculation has been rife as to whether Section 40, known as the “Sword of Damocles” for its anti-press bent, would manage to be repealed. The so-far unenforced section of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, brought in after Leveson, would force publishers to pay legal costs in defamation and privacy cases, for both sides, if not a member of a state-backed regulator. The government pledged to finally kill it with the Media Bill last year and Labour threatened to put a spanner in the works…

Rumours were flying this morning that the Labour frontbench would support an amendment led by Baroness Hollins pushing companies towards a state-backed regulator by promising to protect them from legal costs if they did so. Essentially the carrot route to the same result. Guido hears the Tories and Labour have now agreed to just scrap Section 40 properly…

Anti-press Lords are still putting up a fight – five amendments are tabled that support Section 40’s survival. With any luck they will be quickly swatted aside…

UPDATE: Media Bill has now passed unamended. Section 40 dies…