Examination of Witness (Question Numbers
240-259)
MR ANTHONY
LANGAN
19 MARCH 2009
Q240 Helen Southworth: I was wondering
about the impact and whether the Samaritans have an opinion on
whether they think something more should be done.
Mr Langan: It needs to be explored.
I am a member of the UK Council on Child Internet Safety. I am
sitting on the Industry Standards sub-group and I will make sure
this is one of the issues we will discuss within that if I am
able to bring it up within that sub-group. A lot of this will
refer to the terms of service. A lot will also be open to the
arrangements that we have with the social networking providers
and their terms of service and their desire to actually take those
steps. I feel I cannot adequately answer on these things. ***
It is equally important that people understand the finality of
the act. Taking the photograph away could, and this needs to be
researched further, have an adverse effect on that. It may not
enable people to connect with that individual in a way that could
be helpful.
Q241 Helen Southworth: In terms of
the issue of helpfulness, on television for example, when difficult
issues are being explored, there will be a point at the end where
they say if you have been affected by these issues they show a
contact for help. Do you think this is something that the media
generally are dealing with appropriately?
Mr Langan: Going back to Bridgend,
every time we contacted the newspapers, and again through work
with the PCC, we were able to get messages back to the editors
that we wanted them to make sure that in every piece that they
were writing they were putting sources of support at the bottom.
Q242 Helen Southworth: Were they
doing that without your contact?
Mr Langan: It has been an ongoing
piece of work we have done with them for many years and Bridgend
just meant that we could actually push that issue home.
Q243 Helen Southworth: When the Bridgend
issue was coming out, were people putting at the end of the pieces
sources of support?
Mr Langan: In the majority of
the cases, yes.
Q244 Helen Southworth: Were there
any examples of where they were not or were you content with the
full coverage?
Mr Langan: Off the top of my head
I cannot recall but I could check that. I feel in most of the
cases people were either giving out the Samaritans' or the PAPYRUS
number and on broadcasting, if it was appropriate, they would
give out the name of the BBC action line. You asked me a question
about the families. The impact on families is devastating. I still
feel very touched by that families' meeting I went to. Hearing
the families' stories was one of the most moving things I have
ever heard. I have had similar meetings in Northern Ireland where
families there have also been bereaved in these circumstances.
What struck me about the families is they had a belief in the
media. They had a belief in the press that they could help and
I think sometimes some of those families felt betrayed but maybe
that is too strong a word. I think they were looking for support
and they were talking to people. Some of those families came out
of the experience feeling that the media had let them down.
Q245 Janet Anderson: You mentioned
the meeting in Bridgend but that did not take place until May
and the suicides had started in January. Sir Christopher Meyer
was asked if he felt the PCC had been too late in going down there
and he said "We should have been down there earlier."
Do you think the PCC were a bit slow in getting involved or were
you happy with what they were doing?
Mr Langan: My recollection of
the dates has got a bit fuzzy. I was in Wales quite a lot at that
time and continue to travel to work with the Assembly and with
my Samaritans colleagues there. I thought there was a meeting
in February with the PCC but I would have to check my records
because I have not brought them with me. They did hold an open
day in Bridgend. They had a families' meeting and they had a number
of meetings across the day. I thought that was February but I
would have to check.[1]
Q246 Janet Anderson: If you could check
that because our information was that was in May and if that was
the case that was a bit late. Generally you think they did get
involved at an early stage and their involvement was helpful.
Mr Langan: The involvement of
the PCC was not initiated by us. We were busy at the time trying
to support our volunteers inside Bridgend County to develop an
intervention they were doing called Feet on the Streets which
was about them doing outreach in the community so our focus was
there. We were also very caught up in talking to the media. I
would say actually a lot of the pressure put on the PCC probably
came from Madeleine Moon MP in terms of her desire to see some
action taken there.
Q247 Janet Anderson: Do you think
Madeleine should have had to put that pressure on in order to
make them act or should they have been more proactive?
Mr Langan: Other witnesses have
spoken about the role of the PCC and why it sometimes is not proactive.
I am really not familiar enough with the situation. I feel once
they got involved they were helpful. If they had been involved
sooner, I think what probably would have happened is that the
desist notices that they helped get to editors would have happened
sooner and that would have been helpful.
Q248 Paul Farrelly: I want to try
and set the context in which the press reporting happens before
I ask a couple more questions about the PCC. In 20 months there
were 23 suicides, according to the briefing we have here, in and
around Bridgend. Is that statistic in any way out of the ordinary
in the sense that there may be in one area one suicide in 20 months
or two or three but in many places around the country at some
point there will statistically randomly be 20 or 25? Was there
anything more to the suicides in Bridgend that was more than randomly
out of the ordinary?
Mr Langan: My understanding of
the figures is in terms of the deaths there were six in 2007 and
19 in 2008. I would have to check those figures but there were
also a number of other deaths but because they did not happen
in the under-28 age group they were not reported in the same way.
Looking back at the figures from where I am now, yes it is a significant
number and it is out of the ordinary.
Q249 Paul Farrelly: Is it more than
randomly out of the ordinary?
Mr Langan: I do not know what
you mean by randomly out of the ordinary.
Q250 Paul Farrelly: Let us take tossing
a coin. On average the number of heads and tails will even out
over a long period but at some stage, even though it looks in
terms of probability something funny is going on, you might get
a run of 20 or 30 heads. If you take the whole sample it is a
large number but it is not out of the ordinary because it is random.
That is what I am trying to get at. Was it anything more than
random and were they connected? I want to come to the thesis the
press were reporting.
Mr Langan: Initially it was not
possible to say whether it was out of the ordinary in that respect.
As the situation progressed, we felt that it was a suicide cluster
and various people have spoken about the "Werther effect".
We did begin to believe that it was a suicide cluster so that
is therefore something which is not random. There is a process
by which that is occurring but it is an under-researched area.
Q251 Paul Farrelly: Is there any
evidence that thesis is correct?
Mr Langan: At this point that
is still being developed.[2]
Q252 Chairman: Have there been other
suicide clusters? It is a recognised phenomenon.
Mr Langan: Yes.
Q253 Paul Farrelly: Like people getting
brain tumours, it happens in clusters. It could be statistically
random but some people associate it with electricity pylons. They
make a connection that may or may not be justified. Was it your
belief that there may be a suicide cluster encouraged by press
reporting?
Mr Langan: No, I think we felt
that it may have been a suicide cluster prior to significant media
reporting. Again, I refer to the need for research. We know that
there is some research taking place at the University of Swansea
on the impact of the media. I feel it is better to wait for that
research to come out to see if there are any direct links between
media reporting and further suicides.
Q254 Paul Farrelly: From what I am
hearing now it may well have been a legitimate avenue of inquiry
and thesis for the media to explore that there may well be suicide
pacts encouraged by possible social networking.
Mr Langan: We looked at the issue
of suicide pacts and I do not think there was any evidence of
suicide pacts.
Q255 Paul Farrelly: What do you mean
by suicide cluster?
Mr Langan: A suicide cluster is
when within a given locality you will see a pattern of suicides
taking place. That is what happened within Bridgend County. We
saw within a distinct locality that there were a significant number
of suicides taking place within a distinct period.
Q256 Paul Farrelly: You used the
word cluster and you used the word pact.
Mr Langan: Did you say pact or
pattern?
Q257 Paul Farrelly: I asked what
a cluster was and you answered with the word pattern but that
begs the question what do you mean by pattern?
Mr Langan: A pattern is a number,
a distribution, how those happen within that locality within that
time frame.
Q258 Paul Farrelly: This goes back
to the original statistical question: there may be nothing in
it. It may be just a statistical random aberration.
Mr Langan: It may be but I would
look towards the research which is currently taking place to see
if that is the case.
Q259 Paul Farrelly: You have reached
the concerns whether there may be links and you have undertaken
that research now, but you say you may have thought that before
the press reporting encouraged it. The press could say it was
a legitimate avenue of inquiry, particularly with the growth of
social networking sites, as to whether this statistically large
number of people and their suicides were connected and whether
social networking was in some way responsible or encouraging.
They might say it was legitimate to follow that line of inquiry
in the public interest.
Mr Langan: They might.
1 Note by witness: I can confirm that the month
was May, not February. Back
2
Note by witness: I answered this in the context of Bridgend,
not generally. Back
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