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'We must be able to show world as it is'
161/David Henshaw
David Henshaw was executive producer of 'Undercover Mosque' and is managing director of Hardcash Productions. He explains how the documentary was vindicated by Ofcom...
DATELINE: 24/1/08Twenty years ago, a young black man walked into a pub in Bristol and ordered a drink. Right behind him, a gang of white youths started a chant: "Nig nogs on the starboard bow, starboard bow…" Straightforward, everyday racism. Only this time, it was caught on camera and broadcast on BBC1.
Fast forward 20 years, and another young man walks into a mosque in Birmingham, a supposedly moderate mosque, one apparently committed to interfaith dialogue. The preacher, however, seems less than committed: "Christians and Jews are enemies to Muslims", he says. What about a gay man? "Throw him off the mountain" And women? "Allah created the women deficient." Again, all caught on film, this time broadcast on Channel 4.
Two pretty clear cases of antisocial, illiberal behaviour. But here's the difference. Twenty years ago, Avon and Somerset Police were full of praise for our undercover expose; at last people could see what they were up against, that racism wasn't the invention of an oversensitive race relations industry. How very naïve we were to imagine that such a sensible, realistic reaction would follow the broadcast of Dispatches, "Undercover Mosque".
When the film was first shown, local politicians in the West Midlands were horrified. Something had to be done. The police went to court to obtain a production order to go through our rushes, convinced that there was enough to investigate a possible breach of the law, including the encouragement of terrorism. We said they were wasting their time - what we had filmed covertly was profoundly anti-social, illiberal, and offensive, but we couldn't see that it broke any laws.
It was just plain nasty, and clearly at odds with Green Lane Mosque's supposed commitment to moderation and interfaith dialogue. This was the job of investigative journalism - to expose what was really going on rather than what we were being told was going on. So no great surprise when we heard nothing for months. We assumed it had all gone away. What we really didn't expect was a press statement out of the blue from West Midlands Police and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) saying that not only did the featured Imams have no case to answer, but that they had turned their attentions on us, the programme makers.
They had considered prosecuting us for inciting racial hatred, but decided there wasn't quite enough evidence, so had referred the case to Ofcom, the broadcasting regulator. A CPS lawyer, Bethan David, made one of the most damaging allegations: "The splicing together of extracts from longer speeches", she was quoted as saying, "appears to have completely distorted what the speakers were saying."
Well, we knew all along what Ofcom has now, in forensic detail, shown to be the case. That what was going on here was the simple everyday television technique of editing, reducing material to broadcast length.
Distortion?
At no point in any of the diatribes we recorded, or broadcast from DVDs and tapes, did any of the preachers renege on the offensive statements they made in the film.
Context?
No one from the West Midlands Police, the CPS, or Green Lane Mosque has yet to give us the correct or appropriate context for the notion that women are born deficient, that homosexuals should be thrown off a mountain, or that if young girls refuse to wear the hijab, they should be hit.
But here's the really strange thing. It emerged that in the aftermath of "Undercover Mosque", the West Midlands Police received not one single formal complaint about the programme. Not one. I have now written to the director of public prosecutions and the chief constable of the West Midlands Police asking for an explanation for the highly damaging allegations made in August - allegations that sought to undermine legitimate investigative journalism and which unjustly blackened the reputation of a courageous and entirely honest team of programme makers.
The lingering suspicion must be that here was a police force over anxious to placate local "community leaders". That this took precedence over free speech and, in the words of Liberal Democrat shadow culture secretary Don Foster, appeared to be "an attempt to censor television, stifle investigative journalism, and inhibit open debate."
Last modified: Wednesday, February 6, 2008
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World Press Freedom Day
More reporters are currently imprisoned in Turkey than in any other country in the world. Only a matter of weeks ago lawyers failed to persuade a Turkish court to release a 76-year-old journalist from a Turkish internet news station.
World Press Freedom Day on Friday May 3, 2013 is being marked in Britain by a rally to highlight the dangers facing journalists in Turkey and in this podcast, Nicholas Jones speaks to Barry White, Organiser at the Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom, and Sam Bamford, the TUC's policy officer for Eastern Europe and Africa about the importance of a campaign to highlight international press freedom.
The World Press Freedom Day rally is being staged by the National Union of Journalists at the NUJ head office, Gray’s Inn Road, London WC1 on Thursday May 2, 6pm-8pm.
DATELINE: 27/4/13
UK launch of EU media campaign
DATELINE: 13/3/13
The UK launch of a 'European Citizens' Initiative' calling for EU rules against concentration of media power will take place on Thursday March 21 from 11:00am – 12:30pm in Committee Room 4A at the House of Lords, London. Guest speakers will include actor and activist Hugh Grant (pictured), media consultant Claire Enders, Professor Steven Barnett, Barry McCall (President of the NUJ) and Marc Gruber (Director of the European Federation of Journalists).
A European Citizens' Initiative is an official petition, like a Downing Street petition. If it succeeds in gathering a million signatures across the EU, the Commission is obliged to respond.
This petition calls for the EU to act to protect media pluralism and press freedom.
CPBF Annual General Meeting
DATELINE: 1/3/13
Make a note in your diary
Saturday 13 July 2013 from 10.00am
NUJ HQ, 308/312 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1.
Leveson, media ownership, CPBF future work.
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DATELINE: 26/3/10
Papers from the Media for All Conference
MEDIA MANIFESTO
DATELINE: 26/3/10
The media’s job is to inform and entertain us but we rely on them too to tell us what our rulers and representatives are up to. In the run-up to the Iraq war the government used spin and disinformation in the media to create panic and mislead people. The truth is coming out now, but we need stronger, more independent media to be able to scrutinise governments and make informed choices.
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Previous stories
Free Speech & Censorship
CPBF response to the cartoons
Derek Pasquill
Pasquill Trial collapses
Campaigners welcome FoI climbdown
UPDATE on Vanunu+free speech attacked in USA
Murdoch is "all business" - zero ethics
UPDATE on Vanunu+free speech attacked in USA
Murdoch takeover of WSJ 'is bad news'
Vanunu faces further prison sentence
Campaigners win official secrets case concession
Police attempt raid of Camp for Climate Action
Only slightly Kafkaesque
Signs of cabinet u-turn on FOI
Swiss trio cleared by military court
The battle goes on
State interest v public interest
Review: The Truth is Out There
A very British coup
50 years of censorship
Trial Exposes Bush-Blair Secrets
FoI rethink
Downing St will throw aide to the wolves
Galloway accuses BBC over Blair disc 'ban'
Secrets, lies and diplomats
MPs seek special exemption from FoI laws
Fighting back for freedom
Access all areas?
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