Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1720
- 1739)
WEDNESDAY 23 JANUARY 2008
Mr Roy Greenslade
Q1720 Chairman:
When you were there did you have any feeling that his financial
affairs were in a total mess; that he was crooked?
Mr Greenslade: There were always
rumours that he was short of money, not that you could ever tell
that because he still threw largesse about; even then, in my period
there, he bought the New York Daily News. He once rang
me and said, "I have a splash for you tomorrow, I have just
bought all the papers in Croatia." I tried to point out that
that would not make a great Daily Mirror splash; but, in
other words, we got no inkling. I left in March 1991 and, as you
probably know, he went for his swim in November 1991, so there
was still a six-month gap there. There were always rumours and
some members of staff, noticeably Paul Foot, did their best to
try and track down whether it might be true or not, but we could
not obtain any evidence.
Q1721 Chairman:
And no regulatory authority could have intervened?
Mr Greenslade: Within the paper
probably not but you have to think about the auditors and whether
or not they were doing a good enough job, but that is old news.
Q1722 Chairman:
You can actually prevent, can you not, someone on fit and proper
grounds from taking over as a proprietor?
Mr Greenslade: Yes. That has been
used a couple of times. It was used notably when David Sullivan,
the Daily Sport owner tried to buy a paper in Bristol;
he was considered not a fit and proper person. I actually found
that a rather extraordinary reason for not allowing purchase of
a newspaper and when I have complained previously about subjective
public interest tests that is one of the subjective tests. I absolutely
dislike Mr Sullivan's empire, I dislike Mr Desmond's empire, but
whether that makes them, since they are engaged in legal activities,
not fit and proper people to own a newspaper is, I think, a moot
point, and it is one of those points that I think the Committee
ought to think about in deciding how you make the public interest
test more objective.
Q1723 Chairman:
We will look at that. Tell us about the Murdoch press—you
have worked for both The Sun and The Sunday Times—the
influence there?
Mr Greenslade: At various times
I suppose over four different occasions, so it amounts to 12 years
in total, I worked for Rupert Murdoch. Of course, as an assistant
editor at The Sun, which made me number three on the paper,
my dealings with him were tangential.
Q1724 Chairman:
Who was editing then?
Mr Greenslade: Kelvin MacKenzie.
So I heard a lot from Kelvin about what Mr Murdoch said on the
phone day by day—that would be relayed—"Old gorilla
biscuits has got it in for me today!" He would come out rubbing
his backside as if he had been given a good kicking on the phone.
So he had a really quite interesting relationship with Murdoch
and we below him got to know what was being said. My own personal
dealings with Murdoch during The Sun days and then at The
Sunday Times, where I was also number three in the hierarchy
were fantastically cordial; I never had any reason to think that
he was being unusually interfering. He used to like to gossip,
he used to like to know what was going in the paper; he liked
to know who had said what about whom. I never received a single
instruction from Murdoch to actually not do something or to do
something, although he would certainly hint.
Q1725 Chairman:
But you knew what was expected of you?
Mr Greenslade: Yes. The most important
thing about the selection of an editor and then of the editor's
hierarchy is that you are very well aware of what the proprietor
wants—a lot of second guessing therefore goes on. A classic
example, since we have touched on Maxwell, is when Maxwell died
I was then working very briefly as consultant editor at the Today
newspaper, a paper again, by the way, that Rupert should never
have been allowed to buy, but there we are. I was immediately
asked by the editor at the time, Martin Dunn, if I would write
down all the kinds of things I have told you of my memories of
Maxwell, and I was approached by the then Chief Executive of News
International and therefore Rupert Murdoch's man on earth in Britain
at the time, Andrew Knight, and he said to me, "Rupert would
like you to be kind to Maxwell"—we did not know anything,
by the way, in November about the pension problem, which did not
occur for a month afterwards—and I took that on board. Some
time later, in a reminiscence about five years later I mentioned
that Murdoch had asked me to be kind and I got a phone call from
Andrew Knight to say, "Actually Rupert did not say a word
about that, it was just my idea; I thought he would want you to
be kind and that is why I was telling you." That is a very
typical example about somebody acting on behalf of Rupert who
thinks he is doing it for the best possible reason. By the way,
I think that was a perfectly reasonable thing to ask me to do;
I do not think it changed much of what I wrote anyway. But it
is in the nature of any organisation where there is a hierarchy
that the people below the man at the top will always attempt to
please the man at the top by trying to guess what he wants.
Q1726 Chairman:
What you were saying about Kelvin MacKenzie and The Sun
and the relationship between him and Mr Murdoch and the amount
of advice he was given, if I can put it that way, seems to be
rather different from what the editor of The Sun was saying
last week that really all Mr Murdoch was interested in was celebrity
coverage and Big Brother. It seems to be a bit more profound
than that.
Mr Greenslade: I can only think
that she was either being economical with the truth or that Mr
Murdoch has mellowed a great deal. I think it also goes back to
the difference in Rupert Murdoch's empire and the difference of
society today. The 1980s when I was at The Sun were a fantastically
rugged time; there was still a clash between socialism and Thatcherism
and between communism and capitalism. The collapse of communism,
the collapse of a socialist alternative, as it were—now
I think it is social democratic—has really removed the kind
of ruggedness, so the involvement of Rupert, which was very much
about politics, has been removed to a large extent. Therefore,
it is now who manages best the economy or who manages politics
best, rather than really an ideological divide; and I think that
Rupert really fought that kind of ideological war and used The
Sun as a weapon to do so. I think the difference now is about
whether or not he can maintain the sales of The Sun and
it is an argument about which is the best way of doing it, and
I think Rebekah Wade's evidence reflects that.
Q1727 Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall:
Before I ask the questions I want to ask could you comment briefly
on what Andrew Neil said right at the beginning of his evidence
about the rather extraordinary proposition that lies behind a
lot of this debate, that newspaper proprietors should not interfere,
as it were, in the content of their newspapers. Do you have a
view about that?
Mr Greenslade: Of course! As an
editor you want the greatest amount of autonomy. You are never
likely to rise above the position of editor unless you get extremely
rich; therefore, that is going to be the zenith of your journalistic
career and at that moment you wish to exercise the greatest amount
of power and influence over the content of your newspaper. Anything
which intrudes into that is a pain. I believe that the difficulty
that exists between the relationship between proprietors and editors
is opacity—a lack of transparency. I have spoken about that
in many ways with the Maxwell way at least everyone knew where
you were. It is the discreetness, the using of other channels,
the word on the telephone and then you will have heard rightly
editors want to deny that they are ever influenced and so on by
their proprietors because that gives them a certain sense of dignity,
whereas proprietors wish to cloak it because they do not wish
to be seen involving themselves in editorial interference because
that will bring them into public disrepute and because their papers
will be largely seen as Rupert Murdoch's Times, Rupert Murdoch's
Sunday Times, and so on. So I think what I would always be calling
for is a much more overt and transparent communication between
editor and proprietor and in many ways what Andrew Neil said about
all the financial risks are taken by the owners and so on is perfectly
true; they are the owners. It is, to use a phrase common in Fleet
Street, their train set and they work the signals and they own
the trains and they own the track; and given that they do that
why should they not be involved in what goes into their newspapers?
Let me just introduce this idea to you. The difference between
the newspaper business and any other business is that there are
four reasons for owning a newspaper; I call them the four Ps—profit,
propaganda, prestige and public service. No one really owns a
newspaper for one of those reasons, it is always much more complex
than that; but generally a public limited company will own it
for profit and profits need to be made by everyone else as well—always
not always. For instance, Tony O'Reilly owns The Independent
newspapers which have always made a loss ever since he bought
them; he calls them a calling card, he clearly owns them for prestige.
We know that Rupert Murdoch—and he is quite overt about
it in what he says in the interference of The Sun and News
of the World, that he owns them partly for propaganda and
partly for profit. We know that the Scott Trust will say that
The Guardian they own is for public service, and we will,
by the way, always hear every proprietor pay lip service to the
idea that they are in fact in it for public service, despite the
other reasons. So those four overlapping reasons as they try and
work out their relationship with their editors, as they work out,
most importantly, their public profile, have to be taken on board
in every consideration of the relationship between editor and
proprietor.
Q1728 Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall:
That leads helpfully on to the question of regulation, the possibility
of regulation either internal or external to preserve editorial
independence. You heard Andrew Neil tell us in fairly unambiguous
terms that he thought that was pretty much a waste of time and
that the most important thing that needs to be preserved is diversity
of ownership and if you have diversity of ownership—and
I paraphrase his remarks of course—then most of the rest
of it will regulate itself into a state of balance. Do you have
a view about what he said about that and do you have your own
view—I am sure you do—about whether or not there are
ways in which editorial can be preserved through regulatory structures,
whether they be internal or external?
Mr Greenslade: I have thought
incredibly deeply about this subject because it is the
subject about how you sort this out, and I cannot see that there
could be a form of regulation which would not either inhibit market
freedom or inhibit press freedom. It is incredibly difficult to
find a mechanism which could intervene in that position. All I
would say is that at the moment we have sufficient diversity in
order that we police each other. I think it is quite clear that
the media generally but newspapers particularly are jealous guardians
of their own business and are constantly seeking out weaknesses
in their rivals and trying to point it up and so on. So at least
we police each other. The important thing, therefore, is that
we might call on proprietors not to be so mealy-mouthed and not
to be so economical with the truth about their relationship—we
could call on that, I do not think it would make much difference.
But at the moment as long as you have a mechanism which ensures
diversity that will work better, and that has been the great failing
in the past. There is no real genuine reason why Rupert Murdoch
should have ever been enabled to buy The Times and The
Sunday Times, and certainly no reason why he should have bought
the Today newspaper, giving him five national newspapers
at one time, which he later closed, by the way, which could have
been another voice elsewhere. I think it was the failure of the
regulatory authorities and of the political machine to ensure
that those papers were not sold elsewhere. By the way, Harry Evans
did have a possible consortium; it is perfectly true that The
Times newspaper was a profitable organisation and it was portrayed
as not being, so there was a terrible mistake there, and that
is why we now talk consistently so much about Rupert Murdoch,
because this man controls four very important voices where perhaps
he should only ever have controlled two.
Q1729 Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall:
So do you think that diversity, clearly at the moment, is adequate,
at least?
Mr Greenslade: I do at the moment.
Q1730 Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall:
Do you think it is likely to remain sufficiently protected under
the regulatory system that we have at present? Do you think that
system is robust enough or can you see weaknesses?
Mr Greenslade: I think there are
weaknesses because there is a problem here and let us try to isolate
the problem. It is that some people are very good at producing
newspapers and Murdoch is a classic example of that; and some
people are very poor at producing newspapers. So the difficulty
with maintaining diversity is always how do you ensure in getting
a plurality of voices that you are not stifling the good newspaper
owner, who would give life and breathe life into an organ, and
at the same time ensure that you are not giving your paper to
somebody who eventually is going to kill it off. I think that
is the great difficulty. Really in a sense—and I say that
as a precursor to saying that what you need is a mechanism which
ensures that the tests that you give every time a newspaper is
bought, sold or started has to ensure that it is as objective
as possible, that it segments the audience properly so that you
ensure you are getting a plurality of voice across a segmented
audience—I am talking about class and demographics here—and
at the same time that you ensure that you do not stifle initiative
by those who perhaps have more than they should but at least are
good newspaper owners. I think this is a really difficult conundrum
to sort out.
Q1731 Chairman:
But we are where we are, though, are we not, as far as newspapers
are concerned? We can fight the battles of yesterday—
Mr Greenslade: Yes, you cannot
divest; I am not calling for divestment, I think it would be iniquitous.
What you could say about Rupert Murdoch is that he has kept a
loss making newspaper in The Times going for the best part
of 26 years and you should not take that away from him as he is
on the verge of making a profit from it.
Q1732 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
I think you have pretty well answered this question, but from
the perspective of regulation we have evidence from the NUJ who
feel that there is a strong case for putting the regulation of
press standards on an appropriate statutory footing given the
failure of the PCC to maintain adequate standards of accuracy
and fairness in the press. Do you think there is a case for clauses
being written into journalists' contracts protecting their independence?
Mr Greenslade: No. I think all
newspapers are run in a hierarchical way and if you get journalists
having contracts which in many ways allow them to say, "I
am not doing that, I will not do this," then within the organisation
in which they exist they would simply be frozen out—the
maverick with an organisation will be identified as such, who
will be standing on principles which are perhaps not shared by
the rest of their organisation. I do not mind the collective,
I do not mind if that collective trade union—from which
I have just happened to resign—wishes to stand up and represent
the whole staff; but to put individuals in the position in which
they say, "As my contract of employment I will not do this
or will not do that," I think would create a number of running
troubles and in the end would not actually come out with a positive
result.
Q1733 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
Do you agree with them that the PCC is not doing its job properly?
Mr Greenslade: No, I am not so
down on the PCC. I am a heavy critic of the PCC over specific
matters but I think every case should be taken on its merits.
The failing of the PCC is the failing to adjudicate often enough.
It is an arbitration and it resolves too many cases that I feel
it should go on to adjudicate for.
Q1734 Chairman:
For what purpose?
Mr Greenslade: Because I think
that newspapers escape censure and punishment too often when they
actually at the final hour do some kind of deal to get themselves
out of a mess, when they breach the rules as it were. For instance,
we would not in law allow somebody who had broken the law to say,
"Now that I have apologised right at the final hour no punishment,
please." I think that could be a mitigation circumstance
but the truth is that they do not go to adjudication often enough.
But that having been said, as an example of self-regulation in
a very, very difficult set of situations in which they must not
inhibit freedom of the press, in which they do not have investigative
powers to ensure that the reporters do have the sources they claim
to have, I think it does on balance a pretty good job—better
than the Press Council that preceded it.
Q1735 Lord Maxton:
Do you think it should have the power to investigate without a
complaint?
Mr Greenslade: There are two problems.
Firstly, it would cost a fortune because you would need to increase
the size of the Press Complaints Commission's offices to a fantastic
level. Secondly, and most importantly, I think you would introduce
lawyers into the conundrum; that is, immediately you started investigating
you would have legal apparatus coming in and I think that would
inhibit first of all the speed with which they generally carry
out their work, and I am not absolutely certain in this situation
that it would succeed because most of these investigations would
be about whether or not the journalist had the source they claimed
to have; and because we believe that journalists have the right
to maintain a protection of their sources and their confidentiality
I do not think that would work either.
Q1736 Lord Maxton:
Do you actually believe that there is a concentration of ownership
of the media in this country?
Mr Greenslade: Of overall media?
Q1737 Lord Maxton:
Yes, in the wider sense. If so, do you think it is to the benefit
of the owners?
Mr Greenslade: I think consolidation
has gone about as far as it can and I think it is free flowing;
I think we might see, for instance, other divestments gradually
anyway. The largest media organisation in this country is the
BBC, as you will hear Rupert Murdoch say endlessly. I am happy
about that, by the way, and I am happy that a public service broadcaster
should be our biggest media baron, as it were—that is fine
with me. As for the private ownership of newspapers, we still
have six or seven voices and if you look back through the history
of newspapers, back to the wartime that is roughly the same number
as we have always had. So I am not dismayed about that at all.
I would hate to think that we are going to lose too many but the
truth is—and you did ask about the future—I would
say that we are going to lose voices in the next ten to 20 years
and that might be worrying, except that militating against that,
to go to your point earlier, is that the rise of the Internet
is changing everything. In fact we may be actually discussing
ownership and worrying about ownership of newspapers at the very
minute that the technology is already creating a situation in
which that ownership is going to be less of a problem than it
has ever been in the past.
Q1738 Lord Maxton:
Should we therefore be concerned about the ownership of platforms
at the Internet level rather than perhaps the ownership of specific
titles and specific news outlets?
Mr Greenslade: You could say that,
if you are worried about Google and Yahoo! and so on, although
whether or not they are as influential as papers have been—and
I say that very carefully because I should have said earlier,
but I will say it now, that I believe we are actually seeing that
newspapers are less influential than they have ever been in my
lifetime because we are seeing a fragmentation of the media; and
because if you look at today's Financial Times you will
see that the social attitudes surveyed for this year shows that
far, far fewer people are actually reading a daily newspaper or
even reading the news on websites, so we know that fewer people
now than ten years ago are looking at news on television either.
So we are actually seeing a situation in which perhaps media moguldom
is less of a problem than it has ever been and the most important
thing about the Net is not the portals but about the great blogger
sphere, the fact that you can pick up alternative views much easier
than you have ever done before.
Q1739 Chairman:
You can pick up alternative views but picking up alternative news
is not so easy, surely, and is it not going to be the case that
The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Times Online,
are all going to be important players in the future as well as
newspapers.
Mr Greenslade: Yes. The most serious
newspapers in this country have done brilliantly in terms of engaging
with the digital world. The Guardian, The Telegraph,
The Times and The Financial Times have fantastic
followings across the world, but in Britain as well. The Daily
Mail, I see, now has more readers in America than almost any
other newspaper website in this country. Also, those are four
or five very diverse voices as well, and that is quite apart from
the fact that you can go straight to Associated Press copy or
straight to Reuters copy and pick that up on the Net as well,
so you are actually enabled to see it before the newspapers have
spun it.
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