THOSE poor students who've taken media studies as an A-level only to find it derided today by headteachers as "a soft subject" will no doubt be heartened by examining this week's newspapers.

Reading them would make you think that there were two entirely separate Hutton Inquiries going on.

For instance, yesterday's Daily Mirror had a huge front page headline which read: "Spin Deep Trouble" - a punning reference to the "massive blow to the Government" which it said the evidence constituted.

The Independent, which like the Mirror is a newspaper of leftish persuasion which might normally be expected to be supportive of a Labour Government, ran with the headline: "Two reporters, one story: Campbell sexed up the dossier."

Having studied these headlines, it would seem incontrovertible that Alastair Campbell and the Government are as guilty as hell.

But, turning to the Times, we read: "BBC admits Iraq scoop was flawed" - an entirely different reading.

The Sun went further. "Lies, lies, lies," it screamed. "BBC newsman exposed as a liar." From this it would seem incontrovertible that the BBC had made the whole thing up and that Tony Blair was in the clear.

The media studies student might point out that both the Times and the Sun are owned by Rupert Murdoch who also owns Sky television. It would surely be to Sky's benefit if the BBC could be proven to be transmitting a diet of "lies, lies, lies."

The BBC's terrestrial rival, ITV, has also been very critical of the BBC for a similar reason.

The media student might also point out that the Mirror and the Independent have been fervently anti-war, and to justify their position they need to find anything that shows that the Government went to war on a false pretence.

The most accurate headline of yesterday, then, was in the Guardian: "Gilligan, Kelly, Campbell: tale of flaws, evasion and spin unfolds."

It would have been totally accurate if it had included the word 'media' after Gilligan's name because it is clear that sections of the media are spinning the evidence to make it fit snugly with their preferred version of events.

Indeed, Dr David Kelly himself said in his taped conversation with Susan Watts: "I think it's a matter of perception, isn't it? I think people will perceive things and they'll see it from their own standpoint, and they may not even appreciate quite what they were doing."

Dr Kelly was speaking about the 45-minute claim, but his words are true of the whole affair.

If you hate Tony Blair, Alastair Campbell and the war, you'll find reason enough to find them guilty; if you hate the BBC and its arrogant reporters, there's reason enough to find them guilty, too.

But the probability is that most people sense that all sides are spinning prolifically and therefore all of their versions of the truth have to be taken with a huge pinch of salt - or, like media studies, not bothered with at all.