Max Clifford warns of change to newspaper culture It's gone from one extreme to the other. Hopefully it will get back to a half-way house. Mr Clifford told MPs and peers that a new press regulator needed to be fully independent of newspapers - and hinted that he might like to be personally involved. He said the PCC had proved "not remotely interested" in helping Robert Murat when he was falsely accused of involvement in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. The man was being destroyed by the British media. There was no truth in it at all. The PCC was nowhere to be seen. I could give you 50 examples," he said. He added: "There needs to be a body that takes control. That appreciates that we've got to have a free press in a democracy but which controls the excesses. Members of the public come to me every day of the week because there's nowhere else for them to go because they can't afford lawyers. Celebrities were already well protected because they had legal representation and professional publicists on their cases, Mr Clifford argued. Asked if he saw himself as a potential member of a reformed PCC, he said: "I'm 68 now. I can't keep on much longer so there might well come a time. I enjoy those kind of things. I like it when ordinary members of the public come to me because sometimes you can do things and it gives me huge satisfaction. I suppose, as far as is possible, I'm independent if you see what I mean. Asked directly if that should be seen as an application for the role, he added: "I've never applied for a job in my life and I'm not about to start now."