Supplementary memorandum submitted by
the BBC
EXAMPLES OF PRIOR RESTRAINT IN PRIVACY AND
INTRUSION ISSUES
Angela Canning was convicted of killing her
three babies. As she awaited trial, she allowed a BBC documentary
team to follow her life and the preparation of her defence. Although
appropriately sceptical, dispassionate and impartial about her
guilt or otherwise, the film was made with her and her family's
full co-operation. Canning was later convicted and sent to Durham
prison. When it came to transmission of the programme, to coincide
with the application to appeal against conviction, Canning asked
the BBC to withdraw the film as she feared its transmission would
endanger her life. She claimed that none of her fellow inmates
in Durham Jail knew what her conviction was for but that if they
identified her and did find out via the television programme,
they would attack her. The Governor of the jail let it be known,
while naturally offering no editorial opinions, that although
she did not have a view on the matter; she was not in a position
to offer protection to Canning in a medical segregation unit.
The prison authorities were not able to move
Canning to another jail, where Sally Clarke was awaiting appeal
against the same conviction in time for the transmission. Canning
let it be known that she would feel less endangered in the next
jail if the film went out after she had arrived there and asked
us to hold off transmission until after the move had taken place.
Canning's husband was keen for the film to be
transmitted as he thought it served rather than hindered her case.
The BBC was reluctant to postpone the film. However, in the light
of the prison authorities' difficulty in ensuring Canning's safety,
the decision was taken to postpone the film, pending the move
to the other prison. As it happened Canning was moved to the other
prison and was promptly attacked before the film could be aired.
The BBC takes matters of personal safety extremely seriously and
the prison authorities' difficulty in ensuring safety meant the
BBC decided to be prudent.
The BBC is currently making a series of programmes
in which politicians are invited to live with ordinary families
and do their jobs in order to get an insight into issues on which
they have had a great deal to say in the past. In one programme,
Michael Portillo goes to live the life of a single mother who
has four children and does two jobs to make ends meet. The children's
father, her ex husband, made strenuous objections and wanted to
prevent filming taking place. After making inquiries, it was judged
that although he was not contributing to family finances and he
did not have any legal rights in relation to the children, he
had sufficient interest in the childrens' welfare to make it necessary
to listen carefully to his concerns. He was worried that the programme
would be an invasion of his and his children's privacy that they
would become the butt of bullies at school that the families'
problems (and their problems with him) might be taken out of context.
He had concerns about his own right to privacy even though he
was not going to participate, because of what might be said about
him and his past behaviour. The father threatened to go to law
to prevent the programme going ahead and refused all communication
with the BBC. In the end however, as a result of a calm and patient
approach, the programme makers were able to draw on their considerable
experience of dealing with sensitive subjects and contributors,
together with by good practice set out in the Producers' Guidelines,
to explain the programme properly to the father. This is an example
of how explanation and good practice can allay people's worries
about intrusion, privacy and harm to welfare.
Last year the BBC put out a pioneering series,
the Hunt for Britain's Paedophiles. After two years unprecedented
access by a BBC team, the BBC was in a position to bring unprecedented
material to the screen, to help understand the issues better and
promote informed debate. The BBC decided that with appropriate
safeguards it would identify the paedophiles in the series, including
those who were living in the community. One of these men attempted
to prevent transmission of the programme in which he appeared
arguing Articles 8 and 3 of the HRA. The BBC won its application
NOT to hide the identity of the man on the grounds of the public
interest in open justice and on the grounds that the BBC was taking
appropriate and responsible steps to prevent the public or paedophile
coming to harm.
The BBC recently opposed an injunction in a
case brought before the Family Division concerning a programme
about foundlings. A baby, found aged only a few days, featured
in the programme up to the age of eight weeks. In the programme
he was shown being cared for by Oxfordshire social services and
a foster mother and being prepared for adoption. The prospective
adoptive parents attempted to injunct the programme on behalf
of the child, alleging that it would be harmful to the welfare
of the child now and in the future, and that its privacy was invaded
by being shown on television. Dame Butler Schloss who heard the
case instead took the view that the welfare of the child was best
served by its being in the programme as it might prompt the natural
mother or anyone who knew her to come forward at the last minute.
She overruled the adoptive parents' view that the child's privacy
was invaded.
7 April 2003
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