Britain's Conservatives last night hailed a "humiliating defeat" for the Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, as an injunction preventing publication of details of the Macpherson report on the murder of Stephen Lawrence was effectively overturned.
Mr Straw obtained the High Court injunction on Saturday night, as the first editions of the Sunday Telegraph hit the streets. The paper's story claimed the report would find the Metropolitan Police riven by a "pernicious and institutionalised racism", and cast a question mark over the survival of the Metropolitan Commissioner, Sir Paul Condon.
But as virtually the whole of the British national press backed the Telegraph's bid to overturn the injunction, Mr Justice Rix agreed a variation of the order - still preventing publication of the report, save any parts or extracts already in the public domain.
The Sunday Telegraph story in fact repeated in speculative terms reports that have appeared over recent weeks to the effect that the force would be severely criticised for its inquiry into the murder of the black teenager six years ago, and conclude that the police investigations were hampered by "institutionalised racism".
Sir William Macpherson's report is to presented to the Commons on Wednesday. But the paper, which says it has seen a copy of it, says a strong contrast is drawn between the attitude of the Commissioner, who has always rejected the charge of prejudice, and that of other senior officers who have accepted that racism is ingrained in the service.
In what it interprets as a direct challenge to Sir Paul to make "a humiliating public recantation", the paper says the Macpherson report states: "There must be an unequivocal acceptance of the problem of institutionalised racism and its nature before it can be addressed, as it needs to be, in full partnership with minority ethnic communities." The report adds: "Any chief police officer who feels unable to so respond will find it extremely difficult to work in harmony and co-operate with the community in the way that policing by consent demands."
It is believed the report contains no less than 70 proposals designed to transform race relations within the police and in wider society. While stopping short of calling for the Commissioner's resignation, it is understood it criticises a "lack of rigour" in the reception of an earlier inquiry giving the police investigations a clean bill of health, adding that senior officers, Sir Paul included, should not have needed hindsight to realise something was wrong. The report also rejects criticism of the Lawrence Inquiry itself levelled by Sir Paul as neither "appropriate nor justified".
A spokesman for the Lawrence family had earlier backed Mr Straw's High Court bid to block this "selective" leaking of the report before full disclosure to parliament.
But Sir Norman Fowler, the shadow Home Secretary, welcomed the government "climbdown" saying: "They should never have taken this to a judge and sought an injunction in the way they did. They acted in an arbitrary and high-handed manner and they came a cropper, and they deserved to do so."
The government was elsewhere criticised for seeking the injunction, given its own notoriety for selective press briefing, often in advance of Commons statements.
However attention last night was turning swiftly back to what promises to be a defining moment for policing and justice in Britain. Mr Peter Herbert, chairman of the Society of Black Lawyers, hailed the reported conclusions of the Macpherson inquiry as "a milestone" in race relations. He said: "If these recommendations are right, then Sir William Macpherson and his colleagues have seized the moment."
Mr Paul Cavadino, director of policy for the National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders said: "It is clear from the details published that the Macpherson report will be a watershed in the way the criminal justice system treats black people. Its proposals would improve the way black people are treated not only as victims but also as suspects, offenders and as citizens."