Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 53 - 59)

TUESDAY 6 MARCH 2007

MR LES HINTON, MR ARTHUR EDWARDS MBE, MR PAUL HORROCKS AND MR BOB SATCHWELL

  Chairman: For our next session, I welcome Les Hinton, who appears wearing two hats: that of Chairman of the Editors' Code of Practice Committee and as Chairman of News International; Arthur Edwards, the Royal photographer of The Sun; Paul Horrocks, who is President of the Society of Editors and Editor of the Manchester Evening News; and Bob Satchwell, the Executive Director of the Society of Editors.

  Q53  Janet Anderson: I wonder if I could put this question to each of the four of you, please. The press notice announcing the Committee's inquiry linked it quite clearly to the Clive Goodman case and the trade in personal data identified by the Information Commissioner, and the treatment of public figures by photographers working on behalf of the press. Would you accept that the events that triggered this inquiry raise serious issues and that there is a valid role for politicians—such as those of us on this Committee—to consider whether the present system of self-regulation is the right one?

  Mr Hinton: Unarguably you are right to participate in a debate about whether the self-regulation is sufficient, is proper.

  Q54  Janet Anderson: Do you think that the recent events—

  Mr Hinton: The recent events relating to [...]?

  Q55  Janet Anderson: The Goodman case in particular.

  Mr Hinton: Any event that involves the conduct of the press and our present system of self-regulation is open—in whatever circumstances, frankly, politicians judge—to be open for discussion with us and for debate.

  Mr Edwards: Yes, I think so too. Self-regulation, if it is going wrong, then someone has to come down and make sure it works. Coming here today and sorting it out—I think that is the way to do it, yes.

  Q56  Janet Anderson: Mr Horrocks, you said in your evidence, "The problem with privacy issues is that politicians can easily whip up a storm among the public". Do you think that we are doing that today?

  Mr Horrocks: I think there is a danger of that. I see nothing wrong with the debate, but the fact is that it is all too easy to focus in on one case. As I think I said in my statement, one bad apple does not mean that the whole barrel is rotten. I do not believe that there is widespread bad practice, and I do believe that self-regulation, the role of the PCC and the Editors' Code, by and large, is strictly adhered to. I know that in my own newspaper we regularly discuss adjudications and we regularly go back and back-check our information, to see whether or not there is a potential breach. So the PCC and the Code are highly regarded and it would be wrong to suggest otherwise. I was a little disappointed, when I heard some of the earlier evidence from Mike and Chris that people are coerced into breaking the Code. That is just not my experience. I have been a journalist for over 30 years; I have been the Editor of the Manchester Evening News for 10 years; and I was on the PCC as a commissioner for four years. It is not a common problem, in my experience, that people are being forced into breaking the Code or are pushing beyond the boundaries of what the Code and what the law say you can do. Sure, it is perfectly acceptable to go close, but there must be an overriding public interest were you to consider breaking the Code, and that would then be down to the editor to determine whether those circumstances were correct.

  Q57  Janet Anderson: You specifically mention that in your e-mail to your staff about the use of phone tapping and so on, where you say, "The only exception to this would be in the case of a story which had exceptional public interest and even then such action would have to be sanctioned personally by the Editor". Are you able to give us an example of where that was the case?

  Mr Horrocks: If you were carrying out an investigation into corruption, if you were doing an investigation into wrongdoing, into misdemeanours in public life, misleading the public, those are the sorts of public interest tests that I would want to see applied to our journalism, to make sure that the bar had been set at the highest standard. We are not talking here about tittle-tattle; we are not talking about the lifestyle and the private lives of celebrities. We are talking about serious wrongdoing, corruption, misleading and crime. If we are investigating those subjects and that subject matter, then I think that there will be and can be occasions where a justifiable breach of the Code could take place.

  Q58  Janet Anderson: You have never had a case, for example, where you have thought that to break the Code was in the public interest, but the journalist or the reporter you were asking to do this disagreed with you?

  Mr Horrocks: That can be debated. I do not recall in my experience ever having to have that discussion. When we embark on those types of investigation, it is as a result of debate and everybody being content with the route that we are following. We do not say to journalists, "You must do this because I say so". What we do say is, "We believe that this investigation will be in the public interest. Therefore [...]". Maybe if you were buying drugs—for argument's sake—for a particular reason for an investigation, you would not go along and say, "I'm a reporter from the Manchester Evening News and I want to buy some drugs from you", because clearly that will not work. So you may have to masquerade as somebody else. That potentially is a breach of the Code.

  Mr Satchwell: This inquiry by this Committee not only is quite reasonable and correct, but is welcome. The point I would make is that too often there is an emphasis on the misdemeanours and the things which go wrong with the media and within the PCC system and self-regulation as a whole. The danger is that, because you get a spectacular case involving a big celebrity, a film star, a pop star, a politician or a footballer, there is a level of interest and concern raised which does not reflect the reality. Surely the protection which needs to be there about privacy is about ordinary people? By and large, the media does not have any interest in ordinary people, unless they are doing something which deserves to be enquired into. The point I would make is that I would hope that this Committee, particularly given your remit, would also look at the achievements of the media. It is not all bad. It does things which are good and very rarely gets a pat on the back. In Les Hinton's case, the News of the World had a problem with a reporter on a Royal story and yet, a couple of weeks later, The Sun goes and exposes a case to do with friendly fire in Iraq, which everybody thinks was well done. That is done by a paper from the same stable, but very little praise comes out; very quick to criticise but not very quick to praise. Similarly with the effects of the system that has been brought in for the last 15 years, and the work of the PCC. I do not think that there is any real argument that the behaviour of the press has improved, and that has been to do with the fact that the PCC has been there. I am not saying that it is perfect, and of course it could be developed and improved, but no one seems to recognise the achievements of the system.

  Q59  Janet Anderson: Could you give us an indication on what is an editor's dream story or dream headline? Do they have a kind of list of priorities? What sells more papers than anything else?

  Mr Satchwell: It used to be a Royal story, with a nice cuddly Labrador dog, and a diet thrown in! There are all sorts of stories which are dream stories. With any story it depends on the publication and the nature of that story. Obviously, a story which is soft and about celebrities will sell but, similarly, so will a very serious story about the misdemeanours of government or the police or whatever. I think that it is impossible to say what is the best story.

  Mr Hinton: For the public, there is probably a rule of thumb that the biggest stories are the stories the subjects of which want least to be revealed, in the case of the policy of the Government. The best story I can think of, if you could keep it exclusive, would be the Second Coming.


 
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