Scourge of the rich and famous

DESCRIBED as ‘the most effective journalistic sleuth of his generation’, Tom Bower, left, is admired for investigative books that for ever change the way we perceive the rich and powerful.

From Tony Blair to Richard Branson, Mohamed Al Fayed to Prince Charles, the former BBC Panorama reporter’s forensically researched ‘warts-and-all’ biographies are defiantly unauthorised. Often, they’ve led Bower to court to successfully defend the truth, while crooked publisher Robert Maxwell tried to intimidate the author by setting private detectives on him.

Bower, 74, says: ‘The immorality of the rich and powerful has always fascinated and appalled me.’