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The dogs of Fleet Street show their teeth.
133/Tom O’Malley
Amidst the turbulent political events surrounding the build up to the attack on Iraq of March 2003, the press had to defend its behaviour in front of the House of Commons Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport.This Committee’s inquiry into Privacy has been sparked, in part, by the passage of the Communications Bill through Parliament and the possibility that press regulation might be brought under the remit of the new Office of Communications, OFCOM.
But the dogs of Fleet Street have been showing their teeth, at each other and at politicians.
Paul Dacre, editor of the Daily Mail, attacked the Independent’s editor, Simon Kellner. Kellner had the temerity to tell the Select Committee that there should be an Ombudsman, reporting to OFCOM to hear complaints against Press Complaints Commission decisions. Dacre claimed that Kellner’s comments were ‘based on a total misconception of how the PCC works’.
The Editor of the Sun Rebecca Wade appeared before the Committee in the week that the paper published ‘revelations’ about the private life of Ron Davies, a former Secretary of State for Wales. A better warning to MPs to lay off the press could not have been delivered. Few MPs would have missed the significance of the timing of this story.
The government were equally as sensitive to the dangers of meddling with the owners who back the PCC. Patricia Hewitt, the Secretary of State for the Department of Trade and Industry has declared that no such thing will happen. Quoted in the Press Gazette on 7th March, Hewitt asserted that the government was ‘absolutely committed to self-regulation through the PCC. If we get a proposal in the House of Lords to put the PCC on a statutory footing, we will defend self-regulation by the PCC very vigorously’.
It is important that the Committee carries out these kinds of investigations. For not only does the fact that they come around once every few years testify to the failure of self-regulation, it also highlights the need for sustained campaigning to try and establish both a press freedom law and legislation to allow for swift redress for members of the public who are victims of press inaccuracies. But, as this inquiry shows, the owners and editors will not give an inch without a serious fight.
Last modified: Wednesday, May 7, 2003
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Notices
Events & Announcements
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.
DOWNLOAD FREEPRESS NOW
DATELINE: 26/3/10
Download Freepress in PDF, ePub or mobi format. Issue 194 now available.
MEDIA FOR ALL CONFERENCE
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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