Today the Leveson Inquiry has begun taking evidence from some of its 21 core participants. The Dowler Family, Ashley Cole's solicitor Graham Shear, writer Joan Smith and actor Hugh Grant have all given evidence as the Inquiry begins to unravel the extent of News International's use of phone hacking and evaluate the damage it caused to those concerned.

Bob and Sally Dowler, the parents of murder victim Amanda Dowler, gave evidence first. The news that their daughter had supposedly picked up her voicemail gave the family a great deal of false hope. Jounalism.co.uk's twitter account reported how Sally Dowler recalled sharing this significant piece of evidence with those closest to her: "I told my friends, 'she has picked up her voicemail'." The Guardian records her reaction to the news a "raw moment of euphoria".

The pair recounted how The News of the World intruded on what Sally Dowler described as a "really, really private grief moment" when the couple retraced the walk their daughter took before she disappeared, by taking photographs of them with a telescopic lense and then publishing them in article entitled 'Mile of Grief'. The Guardian Live blog reports how the Dowlers inferred from these pictures that their own phones had been hacked in addition to their daughters

'In her mind she made an immediate connection between the private walk ("mile of grief") and the Birdseye building trip and phone hacking.

Bob: "The walk was nothing to do with Milly's phone."

Sally: "That was our homephone or our own mobile phones."'

Hugh Grant then underwent a two and a half hour questioning session in which he discussed the factual inaccuracies in tabloid reporting regarding his personal life, in particular regarding a Daily Mail article written by Amanda Platell .

Mr Grant revealed that after it took the Press Complaints Commission one year to decide it was unacceptable for a hospital to divulge details of his medical records to the press, he lost faith in the organisation, calling them "ineffectual".

Lord Justice Leveson pointed out that it is difficult to reign in freelance paparazzi, as the PCC does not have control over them, due to the fact they are not employed. He closed with a statement reaffirming his desire to defend good journalism and to rid the popular press of unethical reporting.

"I don't want to see the end of popular print journalism. A free press is the cornerstone of democracy, there is no question about that. I just think there is a section of our press that has been allowed to become toxic over the last 30 years.

"The main tactic seems to be bullying and blackmail and it takes courage to stand up to. I think it's time this country found the courage to stand up [to it now]."

Source: Daily Mail, The Guardian, Journalism.co.uk,