APPENDIX 126
Memorandum submitted by Ms Alison Prager
The murder of my sister and subsequent acute
interest of the media took place in June 2002 (see The Guardian,
28 March 2003 for an account of the family's experience of
the media (http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4635272,00.html).
I was aware of the existence of the PCC and
that there was a Press Code of Practice and that it did cover
intrusion, privacy and harassment, though not specifically grief
and shock. I mentioned this to the police; they looked at me pitifully—they
did not mention the Protection from Harassment Act. The police
did say that if the press went over and above what they were doing
already that we could call them any time. The journalists did
not mention the PCC or the Code. I did not because I did not want
to enter into any conversation with them; I just wanted them to
leave us alone.
After a few days when they started writing notes
and letters to us, we gave the police the notes and letters and
they wrote to the papers that had written to us asking them to
stop. We had no information or advice on these matters, apart
from my conversations with the police at the time. I did not see
television cameras but they were there and did talk to neighbours
and broadcast their comments.
There was a "scrum", the media were
always around throughout the days and late into the evenings.
Driving along the street I saw every few yards there were groups
of them, trying to get comments from the neighbours, congregating
in groups to confer. I didn't see them all in one bunch, they
were more spread out. They were also taking it in terms to knock
at the door, so in that sense they weren't an unruly "scrum",
but obviously a well organised group interacting and sharing information
on how to progress and be the lucky one to get a story. They were
there so much that we just had to carry on and get in and out
of the house and the car and answer the door knowing that we were
being watched all the time. We could always see a few of them
from our windows.
Lord Wakeham has stated: "journalists should
only stay at the scene for as long as the public interest requires
their presence there." If this is the case, they shouldn't
have been there at all. The police were giving them all the information
they required to fulfil their public interest remit.
I would like to mention some other things which
I think pertinent. As you may be aware, acute bereavement and
shock leaves people temporarily extremely vulnerable, on a scale
of 1 to ten, we were at ten. We had to deal very quickly not only
with the grief but body identification, post-mortems, updates
from the police and continuous questions from the investigating
officers essential to the inquiry. The funeral which starts the
healing process is always delayed in these cases, in our case
by three and a half months. No person under these conditions is
capable of being pro-active in defending themselves against the
press.
We did not contact the PCC itself as, not surprisingly,
I did not know it had an emergency number and even if I had, I
doubt if I was in any state to use it. It doesn't say on their
website what the number is for. Nor did I contact any editor of
a paper. With ournalists continually phoning up, the idea of
phoning their editor who's waiting for the story is rather counter-intuitive.
I wanted to get out of the lion's den, not further into it. Even
if I had wanted to, where would I start? The local papers, national
papers and the Jewish press were either outside in the street
and/or phoning us. It would have been quite an operation to phone
them all. We are not an organisation prepared for a media onslaught,
we cannot call on the PR department to deal with the press or
call on the family solicitor, and we don't have one. It wasn't
we that couldn't deal with the press. It was they who were not
dealing with us in an appropriate and civilised way. Any genuine
attempt to address this problem has to take account of this.
I have now read the relevant sections of the
PCC Code. The journalists appear to have taken those guidelines
and treated them as guidelines on how to behave, they were doing
almost every single one of the things it says they were not supposed
to do. They were also doing them with such speed, professionalism
and ease it seemed to me it was not the first time. I suspect
that this is routine behaviour and not an aberration. The police
were full of stories of what the press had done in similar circumstances
and the family liaison officers didn't seem to think this was
anything out of the ordinary. In fact they are using my article
for training purposes for family liaison officers in what to expect
from the press. Also I questioned the police exactly on what they
would and wouldn't do and they knew exactly in advance how they
were going to behave.
At this point I have no intention of making
a complaint to the PCC. They do make an issue of the fact that
they must be doing their job as they are receiving fewer complaints
than previously. However, before they pack up because they've
succeeded in their mission, I think the irrelevance of their procedures
should be considered in cases like ours.
As I have stated we were in no position to complain
at the time. This still stands for several reasons. I don't wish
to read the cuttings. I find them too upsetting and so it's impossible
to complain about the coverage. If I did want to complain, according
to the PCC website, there is only one month to do so, with exceptions.
I don't know what constitutes an exception. As I have explained
it was impossible for us to be able to do this within a few months.
Also, complaints have to be adjudicated and upheld like a trial,
and one trial is enough to be thinking about. A trial of the suspect
has not even been decided on after 11 months. The idea of a committee
adjudicating on an issue connected with such a grave and painful
matter is not pleasant.
What happens if the complaints were not upheld?
I may get a fact wrong, even if I did read the stories. The paper
may have a clever defence. The whole process would not be worth
the upset. Not that my family are strangers to the PCC. My father
had a complaint partially upheld last year, when an editor published
his letter in a paper and changed the figures he used as evidence
for his argument. It is just that to take a case of this nature
forward is too much extra stress. The process is not designed
for people like us in our position. Maybe the PCC could be more
active in taking up complaints on behalf of people by doing a
little policing themselves.
If the question about complaining would apply
to the harassment of the press rather than the content of the
stories, then this would be even more difficult a task. A complaint
obviously has to be specific. Was I supposed to ask each journalist
who rang the doorbell or phoned their name, paper and editor?
Each paper appeared to use more than one journalist, as I mentioned
in the article. At some point they changed tack and women started
to phone. Is anyone seriously suggesting that I should've kept
a register of data to be used in case I wanted to complain at
a later date? They were asking me questions, was I really in a
position to turn the tables and start investigating who they were?
The other point is that if a complaint of inaccuracy
were upheld this would involve more publicity, which is what we
wanted to avoid in the first place. Some "facts" were
printed, for instance that my parents are Hungarian, my sister
was learning to drive, and if she had driven it would never have
happened etc. etc. all untrue and hurtful. Why would I want the
truth to be written? I never wanted anything about us or her to
be written in the first place. Public interest demands that the
facts of the case be reported, but after the suspect was apprehended,
which was almost immediately, there was no public interest argument.
Apart from the judicial proceedings and anything that may come
out concerning care in the community issues, which I think is
of utmost public concern, there was little but gossip, speculation
and titillation. We made it one hundred percent clear that we
did not in any circumstances wish to speak to the press. And yet
they persisted.
I have been asked if we had anything to hide,
and I can see how a trained journalist could think this. People
who appear evasive, avoid answering questions and don't want to
talk about things may have something to hide, This may explain
their persistence: it was as if we were criminals trying to hide
the truth. That is how we were treated. The press did not desist
and as I mentioned in my article, we were forced into a position
of having to make a statement to keep them quiet, as they knew
by then that was all they could hope to get.
Also, as I stated in my article either my e-mail
or web use was hacked into. I know the paper, and they even distorted
the information that they stole, but I don't particularly want
to draw attention to that. It was never a secret; it's just that
they broke the privacy guidelines and possibly the law by doing
that. It's a terrible thing to do to someone who's suffering anyway.
It's unnecessary. Journalists are rewarded by their editors for
getting this kind of information that other papers don't have.
It's at this level that maybe editors should start looking at
whether the Code could have been broken. If it was known that
we weren't speaking to the press, some information might have
to come by breaking the Code. This could be a starting point for
the editors to be suspicious. If there were grounds for believing
that the Code was broken in gathering information for the story,
maybe it shouldn't run.
But I don't believe there is much enthusiasm
from editors or journalists to enforce the Code in a meaningful
way. Various pressures conspire to make this type of story the
bread and butter of the press. Intrusion into privacy doesn't
appear to interest the media except when statutory regulation
is mentioned. The Guardian didn't even think my article was of
sufficient media interest to put it in the media section. They
put it on the Women's page.
They are their own worst enemies in this respect,
because at some point some body such as the Culture, Media and
Sport Committee may well turn round and say "You can't have
your cake and eat it. The public expects more, we expect more,
self regulation doesn't just mean self congratulation" and
in comes some enforced regulation. It's up to the press and the
PCC to be more active themselves. The Society of Editors' Committee
proudly call their Code "A Code that can't stand still".
Maybe now is the time for it to move forward in a significant
and meaningful way in the direction of actively protecting the
public from its members' excesses.
I noticed that the evidence submitted by the
Editors' Code of Practice Committee under Clause 5—Intrusion
into grief or shock, was so glowing about the press' behaviour
I thought perhaps they think the Culture, Media and Sport Committee
should have no concerns about privacy and media intrusion. In
fact the press, according to this evidence, is providing no less
than a service to the bereaved families and liken themselves to
the "clergy" (4.20). They go on "Death, perhaps
especially in tragedy, offers an opportunity to honour the life
which has been lost" they talk about the difficulties the
family may face in providing "a lasting—and last—memorial
. . . where the person who has died has not had a public profile,
and there is no file in the cuttings library which could be relied
upon." Of course not. The week before the press weren't interested
in them.
This confirms my belief that journalists are
deliberately using their own code of practice to hide their actual
practices. I am sure all journalists know the Code very well.
As the Society of Editors state (3.12) "As testimony of industry
commitment" they have issued "a wallet-size fold-out
format". Unfortunately familiarity with the Code does not
appear to stop the "gamut of issues which concern readers"
including "accuracy, distortion, privacy, including . . .
harassment, and protection of . . . vulnerable groups," (3.12)
being disregarded.
I did wonder why the journalists suddenly started
to talk about memorials. Obviously, it was seen as a convincing
pretext for further intrusion. I am aware that some bereaved families
do like to talk to the press and I respect this decision. However,
our wishes should have been respected as well.
As a citizen I try to take an interest in the
society in which I live. I noted that all the people, organisations
and institutions I came into contact with after this tragedy,
without exception, showed a heartening compassion and caring.
Except for one: the press, the individual journalists, without
exception behaved in a calculated, callous and cruel way. They
are the only institution who, at the same time, has a code of
practice specifically dealing with this exact type of event. They
also have the disingenuousness to display it and submit it as
evidence they are keeping to it.
I believe it would be in the public interest
if they were challenged on this.
12 May 2003
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