A leading defamation lawyer has called for conditional fee agreements to be preserved to help victims of press abuse.

Steven Heffer, chair of the Lawyers for Media Standards group, said individuals must be given the means to fight legal battles against media outlets that have acted improperly.

He argued that recent high-profile cases such as the alleged victims of phone-hacking should be able to take their case to court without fear of financial reprisals.

If implemented, Heffer said the Ministry of Justice’s plans to reform the rules governing CFAs in libel and privacy claims will ‘irrevocably shift the balance of power to an even greater extent in favour of huge media corporations as against the ­individual’.

In a letter to the House of Commons and House of Lords, he said that fewer lawyers will be able to take the risk of acting on ‘no win, no fee’ agreements, with the after-the-event insurance market in this area of law disappearing altogether.

Opponents of reform are concerned that MPs may not fully appreciate the implications of the changes, which form part of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill currently passing through parliament.

Heffer warned that MPs should not assume that libel and privacy laws are the ‘plaything of undeserving celebrities and footballers’.

‘Lawyers acting under CFAs currently provide the only effective form of regulation against press abuses for the individual of modest means, that is for holding to account serious abuses by the press,’ he said.

The MoJ asserts that the reforms are necessary to control legal costs and balance a legal system that allows claimants to sue for compensation with little financial risk.