British press, heal thyself

As the hacking scandal engulfed Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World and started to lap around other titles, an important issue was swept into the background: the future of press self-regulation. This is carried out by the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), a newspaper-funded body.

The issue seemed to have been decided by David Cameron when he set up an inquiry into the ethics and standards of the media. The inquiry will run alongside a judicial investigation of phone hacking and illegal payments to police. “The Press Complaints Commission has failed. In this case, the hacking case, frankly it was pretty much absent. Therefore we have to conclude that it’s ineffective and lacking in rigour,” said Cameron.

But he should add another item to the inquiry agenda: how to prevent the demise of more national newspapers, particularly if Rupert Murdoch were to turn his back on the heavily loss-making Times.

The PCC was hopelessly conflicted because it contains newspaper editors, who in turn pass judgement on other editors. As a result, it lacked public confidence. “I believe we need a new system entirely,” said Cameron. “It will be for the inquiry to recommend what the system should look like.” Nick Clegg agreed and, in a rare case of political unanimity, Ed Miliband denounced the PCC as “a toothless poodle.”

On Newsnight Greg Dyke, the former director-general of the BBC who started his career as a newspaper reporter, said he saw no reason why the press should not be brought under statutory regulation alongside broadcasting. After all, such regulation had not prevented broadcasters from carrying out courageous, significant journalism.

A similar theme emerged during an episode of the Daily Politics show, when Andrew Neil savaged Baroness Buscombe, chair of the PCC. Neil repeatedly challenged her to name one thing the commission had done during the hacking scandal. Buscombe, a barrister, looked shocked at the onslaught, but nonetheless managed to contribute a few telling words. The areas complained of were already subject to statutory regulation. It was called criminal law.

Is there anything that can be said for this “toothless poodle”—set up by David Mellor MP in 1991 following the Calcutt inquiry? Actually quite a lot. The PCC succeeded the Press Council which, since 1953, had tried to set standards and adjudicate on complaints. Editors now serve on the commission, but a majority are “public members.” Recent appointments include former BBC chairman Lord Grade, Jeremy Roberts QC, a former central criminal court judge and Michael Smyth, chairman of Public Concern at Work and a former senior partner at Clifford Chance, the law firm—hardly press industry patsies.

The PCC has a good record in dealing with thousands of complaints from members of the public on matters of accuracy and press intrusion, and in mediating between press and public. The commission also recently found in favour of Vince Cable, the business secretary, after young Daily Telegraph reporters posed as constituents and recorded meetings with him in his constituency office.

But where was the PCC throughout the phone hacking scandal? It was not the PCC’s finest hour but, as Baroness Buscombe has argued, the commission was allegedly lied to by News of the World executives and misled by the police. “We do not accept that the scandal of the phone hacking should claim, as a convenient scalp, the Press Complaints Commission. The work of the PCC, and of a press allowed to have freedom of expression, has been grossly undervalued,” the PCC argues.

Reform is now necessary. The PCC has tended to deal with individual complaints; but it should be willing to investigate general complaints against the press. Further funding must be provided by the newspaper industry to enable such investigations to be properly carried out. For the sake of appearances, the role of editors on the PCC, already a minority, should be downgraded to that of advisers.

However, the issues raised by the prime minister’s inquiry are potentially far more threatening to freedom of expression than reform of the PCC. The worry is that statutory regulation and restrictive laws on privacy would be the result—an outcome that would be welcomed by sleazy footballers, errant actors and hypocritical politicians.

The danger is that the press would lose its hard-won freedom to be raucous, scurrilous and down-right scandalous—within the law. Blandness would descend. The press, already reeling from the economic impact of the internet, would go into even steeper decline. Statutory regulation with “teeth,” such as fines or even the temporary suspension of publication, would inevitably bring in the lawyers. This would increase both costs and delay.

Ironically, the calls for statutory regulation of the press come at the very moment when arguments are increasing for the deregulation of broadcasting. Even Mark Thompson, the BBC director-general, has argued that in an age of hundreds of channels, the time may have come to liberate opinionated or even thoroughly partial content. The BBC as the public service broadcaster would continue to set traditional standards and would be held to the existing rules of impartiality.

When the gangsters of journalism and corrupt police have all been rounded up, it will be time to have an extensive debate on the duties of a free press. Above all, a balance must be struck between the conflicting articles in the European Convention on Human Rights—between the right to know; and the right to a private life.