Examination of Witness (Question Numbers
227-239)
MR ANTHONY
LANGAN
19 MARCH 2009
Q227 Chairman: Can I thank you very much
for coming and giving evidence. This is, as I think you know,
a session that we are holding entirely in private particularly
for the benefit of Mr Fuller who will be coming after you. It
is part of a wider inquiry we are doing in the whole area of press
standards, privacy and libel. Obviously the reporting of suicides
is a particularly difficult and sensitive area and the lessons
from Bridgend are ones we are keen to hear. Could you start by
giving us an overview, on behalf of the Samaritans, as to how
you see the media's treatment of the question of reporting suicides?
Mr Langan: The Samaritans, as
the Committee will know, is an organisation dedicated to reducing
suicide. We have worked with individuals since 1953, some years
before suicide was decriminalised, so we were actually working
with people who were potentially criminal before the 1961 Act.
We have also worked very closely with the media; in fact the name
Samaritans came from the Daily Mirror who gave us the name.
We have always been very keen to work with the media because as
an organisation with limited resources we value the role of the
media in telling people about our service. In 1991 we published
our first media guidelines which some of the Committee may know
and, for the record, can be found at www.samaritans.org/media.
We have used the media guidelines with policy makers and regulators.
Significantly, as the Committee may know, in 2005 we managed to
secure a change in the PCC's Code of Practice to include a new
clause, 5(ii), on the reporting of suicide. In the light of what
happened in Bridgend, I think appropriate reporting and the impact
that has on vulnerable people and copy cat suicides were issues
we had to address very quickly. In terms of where we were, to
briefly get this out, we began in a situation where we felt some
of the media stories were damaging, probably counter-productive
and through interventions from ourselves and from members of this
House we were able to work with the PCC and editors quite quickly
to address some of those concerns. At this stage in the process
we still need to keep working with the PCC and probably with the
Code Committee to look at how that Code works and whether we can
do some extension to that remit. That is where we are at the minute.
Q228 Rosemary McKenna: Talking about
the PCC Code, does it give enough guidance on the issues surrounding
suicide reporting?
Mr Langan: In itself I do not
think it does. One of the things that Bridgend threw up is within
the remit of the PCC a lot of things fall outside that Code. There
were particular issues around the re-publication and duplication
of photographs. The new Editor's Codebook talks about dramatisation
of suicide and I think it is equally dangerous to look at the
normalisation of suicide. When we looked at the regular re-publication
of 10 or 20 photographs of people of a certain age then other
people of that age would see perhaps a pattern of normalisation
and that was equally dangerous. The current Code does not address
that. We think the guidance note behind that could do with some
work but we see the Code of Conduct as a working document. We
want to keep working with the PCC and the Code Committee to extend
that remit so it is actually going to go further.
Q229 Rosemary McKenna: There is a
question about their expertise. Do you think they have the necessary
expertise to adjudicate on the reporting of the suicide cases
that we have seen?
Mr Langan: I am not familiar with
that conversation I have to say. In our dealings with the PCC
what they have always stressed to us is they are not of the media,
they are separate to the media, and in that respect they have
the ability to look across the piece. I do not feel qualified
to talk about their expertise.
Rosemary McKenna: It is a very specific
area and they really ought to have some kind of expertise.
Q230 Chairman: That suggestion was
specifically raised with us by PAPYRUS. Are you familiar with
them and would you think they are probably pretty good advocates?
Mr Langan: We work very closely
with PAPYRUS. In terms of Bridgend, I know PAPYRUS said that they
initiated a principle of not speaking to the press. We decided
to work differently in that respect. In our view, we felt it was
important to make sure that the objective we were getting across
was, first of all, to make sure that people were looking at this
properly and were not picking up on some of the slightly less
evidence-based conclusions that were being drawn about why these
suicides were taking place. There were discussions around internet
death cults and other things and that have never been proven.
Again, to refer to some of the previous witnesses' evidence, we
felt there was a potential that if the press were not being spoken
to, then stories would go ahead based on limited sets of information
***. We do work very closely with PAPYRUS and we continue to do
so. I am not familiar with the argument about the question of
expertise. In terms of our own work, once the PCC got involved
we found them very helpful.
Q231 Rosemary McKenna: Did they come
to you for advice?
Mr Langan: Since Bridgend they
have come back to us. My invitation here today has been somewhat
helped by the PCC. I have also worked with them on delivering
a seminar to students at the LSE and academics there on the politics
of talking about suicide in the media so it is a developing professional
relationship.
Q232 Mr Hall: Reporting on these
issues is quite a difficult thing because it is a very personal
tragedy for the families yet there is quite a lot of public interest.
What do you think of the press coverage that surrounded the Bridgend
suicides?
Mr Langan: As I mentioned earlier,
some of the initial stories did cause us concern. When we began
to look at these we realised ourselves that in terms of complaining
to the PCC they were outside their remit. *** We would contact
the papers to actually talk about our concerns, about how things
were not being represented. Our focus at that stage was to talk
to the papers locally to see what we could sort out. If you look
at the PCC, and I have been thinking about this quite a lot, in
terms of the change that Samaritans would want to see, the PCC
is able to make a level of redress but again, as other witnesses
have said, once the story is out there it is out there. We are
looking now at how we can actually *** help in the development
of those codes. It is more important that we are preventing future
deaths and preventing inappropriate reporting.
Q233 Mr Hall: You said you had concerns
and they were reported outside the remit. Could you be slightly
more specific about what the concerns were and where they had
gone beyond the remit?
Mr Langan: Probably in the duplication
of those photographs. Early on a number of papers, and it is difficult
for me to remember the names now, would publish either a front
page or a double page spread and around the perimeter of the page
you would see the photographs of the young people. Again, because
it was developing a picture of a youth group, potentially looking
at suicide as a normal life choice, we thought that was potentially
dangerous.
Q234 Mr Hall: Did you think it contributed
to further suicides?
Mr Langan: It is a difficult question
to answer. Any view of suicide and suicide research is a long-term
issue. It is only now that some of the researchers, particularly
Professor Keith Hawton at Oxford, are beginning to look at that.
I know there is some work taking place in Wales as well to look
at media and whether that has had an impact ***
Q235 Mr Hall: Am I right in thinking
there is no protection against the names of people who have committed
suicide being reported?
Mr Langan: I am not a legal expert
but I do not believe there is a privacy law for the dead as such.
Q236 Mr Hall: Would that help?
Mr Langan: I am not an expert
on these things. It is difficult to say. What Samaritans wanted
to see in this situation was a discussion around the issue that
was positive and useful.*** Though it is not a crime, because
suicide is not a crime, it is often stigmatized. ***
Mr Hall: For juveniles there is a lot
of protection in the press if you are alive with loads of restrictions
on reporting but the minute you are dead there is not.
Q237 Helen Southworth: Following
on from what Mike was asking but slightly sideways, can I ask
you about the impact on families and your experience at the Samaritans
of the impact on families of somebody who has committed suicide
generally? Do you have an opinion on whether newspapers should
have to seek the consent of a next of kin before they publish
photographs and details of somebody who has committed suicide?
There is an issue around intrusion and privacy of somebody who
is the closest relative who must be feeling very considerable
grief and possibly guilt and anxieties around the fact that they
themselves have not been able to do anything to prevent it.
Mr Langan: In terms of the issue
around next of kin, it is a difficult one to answer particularly
from a Bridgend perspective because a lot of the photographs that
were used, as the Committee may know, were harvested from social
networking sites.
Q238 Helen Southworth: That is a
why I asked about consent before publication because it is so
easy to get hold of them.
Mr Langan: It is easy because
by the very nature of them they are in the public domain. They
could be harvested because in effect there was an informed consent
that that photograph was there to be shared. My answer will draw
me back to the work we are doing with the PCC. In terms of what
happened at Bridgend, once the PCC became involved they did hold
a meeting with the bereaved families and it was at that meeting,
which I was fortunate—although it is wrong use of the word—to
be invited to, the issue around re-publication of photographs
was actually discussed at some length. I do not think it is possible
with the public domain pictures to seek consent.
Q239 Helen Southworth: We have been
looking at issues around protecting privacy on the internet as
well as within the media. For example, in terms of data protection
if you receive a piece of information you can only use it for
the purpose for which you are given it. In social networking sites
people are giving you information about themselves and their lives
not necessarily with consent to use it for an invasion of privacy
on another issue. I am wondering whether that is something we
need to explore a little more, whether there is an issue about
needing consent to use it for other reasons.
Mr Langan: It would be an interesting
issue to explore.
Helen Southworth: Also consent from the
third party, the next of kin. If a person has died, you can publish
information about them without having issues around libel and
they therefore have no longer given consent. I am wondering whether
these are the sort of things we should ask people to look at.
Chairman: I have done quite a lot on
the use of photographs on social networking sites and there have
been rulings on this. Part of the question is the privacy settings
of the person putting up the photographs.
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