APPENDIX 7
Memorandum submitted by Mr David Chipp
I have spent some 50 years in journalism, first
as a Foreign Correspondent for Reuters and then as Editor
in Chief of the Press Association. In "retirement" I
am still actively involved in press matters and travel widely
throughout the world.
In 1991, I was invited to become a founder member
of the Press Complaints Commission and I accepted because I believe
in self-regulation; all my experience having demonstrated that,
for all its weaknesses, it works and no one has suggested anything
better. There is no doubt that in its early days there were significant
flaws in the operation of the PCC and in the day to day work we
were acutely aware of these. But these weaknesses were addressed
through consultation between commissioners and editors. The code
was strengthened, and the administration strengthened so that
complaints were dealt with much more speedily and efficiently.
Press legislation produces delays in adjudications,
decisions and the righting of wrongs because lawyers inevitably
become involved in the interpretation of any statutory code.
A privacy law would, like libel, become the
preserve of the rich and prominent. They would use injunctions
and prior restraint to prevent the press from pursuing uncomfortable
but necessary investigations. The late Robert Maxwell tried it
all too often. Recently the PCC upheld a privacy complaint brought
by a couple who had been photographed in a café. Would
they have had the resources, both financial and in terms of effort,
to take such a complaint to the courts? The PCC settled it in
a matter of days.
I have been much involved over the past couple
of years in discussing self-regulation with journalists and politicians
all over the world, particularly in the Commonwealth. In my view
press legislation at Westminster, to which many still look, would
give a disastrous message and would fortify the opponents of press
freedom.
27 January 2003
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