Memorandum from the Newspaper Society
1. The Newspaper Society represents the
regional newspaper industry. Its members publish around 1,300
regional and local newspaper titles throughout the United Kingdom.
2. Many local and regional newspapers have
particular and longstanding close local connections with the armed
forces and their families, who are part of the local communities
served by their titles. They maintain coverage at all times of
any issues of particular importance to their forces' readership.
In addition, in times of conflict, regional newspaper journalists
report the armed forces' activities, as embedded and as independent
correspondents. On behalf of the regional press, the Society has
a continuing dialogue with the Ministry of Defence on matters
such as The Ministry of Defence Green Book: Defence and the
Media in Times of Emergency (the practical arrangements for
enabling journalists to report on operations, including the MoD's
plans for representative numbers of correspondents to accompany
British Forces. It also addresses the policy and principles that
will facilitate—and may limit—the activities of reporters
during operations). There are also of course wider spheres of
relevant interests and publication issues, including the DA Notice
Committee, whose regional press representatives are nominated
by the Society.
3. The Society has a particular interest
in open justice. It has been involved in many discussions and
negotiations over many years with relevant government departments
on the scope of prospective reporting restrictions and the media's
formal rights of notification, of hearing, of review by the court
or tribunal or other forum itself, of judicial review and of appeal
that enable formal challenge of the decision to impose reporting
restrictions and that enable the reconsideration, variation or
lifting of such restrictions.
4. In practice, such rights and such review
and appeal mechanisms are very important components of open justice
and press freedom. Reporting restrictions affect not only straightforward
reports of the proceedings of courts, tribunals and disciplinary
proceedings but local newspapers' coverage of the surrounding
issues and their contacts with those concerned in them. This includes
coverage of courts martial. It can prevent or restrict contemporaneous
reporting of matters of real public interest at a local, regional,
national or international level. It can also affect reporting
of importance and interest to its local community, even of such
innocuous matters as local parents' contact of their local newspapers
before their departure abroad or elsewhere, just to express their
concern and their support for their children who are facing courts
martial and intention to be near them to show their support for
them during the proceedings.
5. The Guardian has submitted evidence to
the Committee on the reporting restrictions made in the court
martial of Fusilier Bartlon in January 2005 and lack of formal
appeal procedure available to the media. The Newspaper Society
supports The Guardian's submission for amendment of the Armed
Forces Bill to restore a mechanism for appeal against reporting
restrictions imposed upon courts martial. As that submission sets
out, it appears that removal of the power of the High Court to
exercise judicial review of a court martial (Supreme Court Act
1981, section 29 as amended by section 23 of the Armed Forces
Act 2001) inadvertently also removed the formal means of media
challenge of any reporting restriction without any replacement.
6. The Newspaper Society would be grateful
if the Armed Forces Bill could be amended to restore a right for
the media and any person interested to challenge reporting restrictions
in courts martial proceedings.
January 2006
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