At the time it was calling for the age of consent to be lowered to just four

He is revealed as a founder member of campaign to defend PIE

Police suspect the group of abusing children on an 'industrial scale'

He was a key backer of the notorious Paedophile Information Exchange

Lord Justice Fulford was named last year as an adviser to the Queen

One of Britain’s most senior judges actively campaigned to support a vile paedophile group that tried to legalise sex with children, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Lord Justice Fulford, named last year as an adviser to the Queen, was a key backer of the notorious Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE) which police suspect of abusing children on an ‘industrial scale’.

An investigation by the Mail on Sunday has discovered that Fulford was a founder member of a campaign to defend PIE while it was openly calling for the age of consent to be lowered to just four.

Implicated: Lord Justice Fulford, pictured in his full legal regalia, was named last year as an adviser to the Queen

It can also be revealed that the Appeal Court judge and Privy Counsellor:

Planned demonstrations outside courts where defendants – described by prosecutors as ‘sick’ and a ‘force for evil’ – were on trial.

Wrote an article claiming PIE, now under investigation in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, was merely a way for paedophiles to ‘make friends and offer each other mutual support’.

Sought help with the campaign from future Labour Minister Patricia Hewitt, then in charge of a controversial civil rights group.

Attended meetings to discuss tactics with PIE chairman Tom O’Carroll, who has since been jailed for possessing thousands of pictures of naked children.

Was praised by the paedophile group for coming to its defence.

Fulford was a founder member of an organisation called Conspiracy Against Public Morals set up to defend PIE leaders facing criminal charges.

It later published a sickening pamphlet claiming that children would be freed from the oppression of the state and their parents if they were allowed to have sex with adults.

The 60-page document, unearthed by The Mail on Sunday, is adorned with disturbing child-like pictures and sexual cartoons.

At the time the organisation went under a slightly different name but had the same postal address as Fulford’s group had.

When asked last night about his involvement in the group, Fulford said: ‘I have no memory of having been involved with its foundation or the detail of the work of this campaign.’

He added that any contribution he made would have been in general terms against a law banning ‘conspiracy to corrupt public morals’ which he believed ‘could be used against a wide variety of people in potentially inappropriate ways’.

‘I have always been deeply opposed to paedophilia and I never supported the views of the PIE,’ he added.

Fulford is the most senior public figure to be implicated in the work of PIE.

Today’s revelations follow controversy over the roles of Labour grandees Patricia Hewitt, Harriet Harman and her husband Jack Dromey, who were all involved in the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL) when it counted paedophile activists among its members.

Last night Fulford said: ‘On reflection the NCCL gay rights committee should never have allowed members of PIE to attend any of its meetings.

'I am very sorry for what happened. I have never espoused or in any way supported the objectives of PIE – the abuse of children – which I consider wholly wrong’.

Nonetheless, the revelations are likely to raise questions about what vetting he underwent during his career.

However Fulford insisted ‘There was nothing to report to the Lord Chancellor’s department... at the time of my various appointments.’

The revelations also prompted fresh calls for a full investigation of the links between the Establishment and paedophile groups, following long-running allegations of cover-ups.

Scotland Yard is already looking into PIE as part of Operation Fernbridge, its probe into allegations of a child sex ring involving senior politicians at a south London guest house.

As The Mail on Sunday revealed last year, the Home Office is also carrying out urgent checks into a whistle-blower’s claims that taxpayers’ money was handed to PIE.

Labour MP Tom Watson said: ‘Today’s revelations reinforce the argument that there should be a full investigation into the role of PIE.

'It’s incredible that someone of such distinguished legal authority could misunderstand the need to protect children.’

Tory MP Sir Paul Beresford added: ‘I find it staggering. It wasn’t a clever or appropriate campaign. They were a paedophile group and at the end of the chain were little children’.’

Peter Saunders of the National Association for People Abused in Childhood, said it was ‘more than alarming’ that anyone in the judiciary could be linked to PIE.

Fulford, now 61, is the most senior public figure to be exposed as an apologist for paedophiles among Left-wing political groups of the 1970s and 1980s.

He has enjoyed a stellar rise through the legal profession, becoming a QC in 1994 and a part-time judge the following year.

In 2002 he became the first openly gay High Court judge, being nominated for a knighthood by Tony Blair, and in 2003 took up a prestigious role at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Last year he was nominated as an Appeal Court judge by David Cameron and appointed to the Privy Council, the elite group of senior politicians, judges and clergy who advise the Queen on constitutional matters.

Back in the late 1970s he was a newly qualified Left-wing barrister when he joined the NCCL, now known as Liberty, which had links to known paedophile groups and attempted to lower the age of consent to 14 and water down child pornography laws

Fulford’s involvement with the radical movement to legalise child sex goes even further than that of the Labour Ministers, documents uncovered by The Mail on Sunday show.

He personally set up a group to support the ‘executive committee’ of PIE in the summer of 1979, after they had their homes raided by police.

Images of child abuse and group literature were seized and five leaders, including chairman O’Carroll, were charged with the rare offence of ‘conspiracy to corrupt public morals’.

Fulford and his colleagues called the organisation the Conspiracy Against Public Morals (CAPM), and it went on to distribute leaflets calling for the PIE ‘show trial’ to be dropped, and held protests outside courtrooms.

In October 1979 Fulford wrote a full-page article in gay rights magazine Broadsheet, in which he was described as ‘the founder’ of the PIE support group.

He claimed that classified adverts placed by PIE members, which led to the trial, were ‘simply to enable paedophiles to make friends and offer each other mutual support’ rather than to contact children or exchange banned images.

A leaflet distributed by CAPM and available through PIE’s mailing list went further, claiming: ‘This is a trumped-up charge designed to silence a group merely because it is unpopular with the guardians of public morality.’

And the prosecution was condemned as ‘an attack on PIE’s right to freedom of speech and freedom of association’.

A longer briefing note put together by the CAPM called the paedophiles a ‘minority group ripe for bashing’ because they were open about their aims.

In 1980, a Marxist collective used the almost identical name, Campaign Against Public Morals, and the same Central London PO Box address as Fulford’s group to publish a 60-page diatribe that called for the age of consent to be scrapped ‘for the liberation of children’.

The revelations follow controversy over the roles of Labour grandees Patricia Hewitt, left, and Harriet Harman, who were all involved in the National Council for Civil Liberties when it counted paedophile activists among its members

Fulford successfully proposed a motion at the August 1979 conference of an established gay rights group, the Campaign for Homosexual Equality, that it should affiliate itself to his new group and also call for the PIE leaders to be cleared.

His actions were praised in the paedophiles’ in-house journal, Magpie, which declared: ‘No longer alone – new group to support PIE’ and said they ‘owed much to a speech by barrister Adrian Fulford, which Gay News declared to be the best made at the conference.’

The following month the CAPM held its third meeting at which Fulford and O’Carroll himself were present, as well as several members of the NCCL gay rights committee.

Minutes of the gathering show that they discussed picketing the magistrates court where the PIE defendants appeared and state ‘Adrian’ would ‘ask Patricia Hewitt about the possibilities of using NCCL’s number to take messages’.

Probe: Labour MP Tom Watson said there should be a full investigation into the role of PIE

Records show PIE leader O’Carroll – who was jailed for two years in 1981 – was a member of the gay rights committee at the same time as Fulford.

The paedophile group was often discussed at the gay rights committee’s meetings, and O’Carroll was given its support as he came under increasing public pressure.

Last night, Fulford admitted he attended meetings of the NCCL gay rights committee when O’Carroll was there, but added that his presence ‘left me feeling extremely uncomfortable’.

He added: ‘In the main, I provided some legal advice in the context of general civil liberties objections to the wide-ranging charge of conspiracy to corrupt public morals.’ And he stated that he has never wanted the age of consent to be lower than it is now.

PIE folded in 1984 after the arrest of several more leading figures, including one – Steven Adrian Smith – who had worked at the Home Office.

Miss Hewitt, Miss Harman and Mr Dromey have now expressed regret for the paedophile activists involvement with the NCCL, while insisting they never condoned child sex and that PIE did not influence their policies.

However archive material shows the NCCL’s Nettie Pollard actually invited PIE to become an affiliate group in 1975, offering them the chance to propose motions and take votes at its conferences.

Last night, Fulford said: ‘On reflection, the NCCL gay rights committee should never have allowed members of PIE to attend any of its meetings and a clear separation should have been created with the two organisations.’