At Conference last September, I proposed a motion that called for new rules to beef up the PCC, making it more independent of newspaper editors and giving it real powers to regulate the wilder elements of the press. The motion called on Lib Dem ministers to act now in the face of a growing number of legal injunctions that were being fuelled by lack of confidence in the regulator. In the long run lack of action would stand to restrict press freedom, I argued, because it would give weight to calls for an illiberal privacy law whereby politicians could tell the press what they could or could not report. Alternatively there would be a privacy apartheid between those who could afford to gag the press, and those who could not (that’s to say, most of us).
“For Liberal Democrats, such injunctions will be seen as a worrying development,” I said.
“Our party’s constitution emphasises that we must “defend the right to speak, write, worship, associate and vote freely. That cannot happen if those who can afford expensive lawyers can gag the Press by using the courts.”
The motion drew a lively debate, and was passed by the federal party with two minor amendments. Yet since then, to my knowledge, not a word has been uttered about reforming the PCC by any Lib Dem minister or MP.
In the wake of the Ryan Giggs fiasco, we can now see this as a missed opportunity. But the debacle could yet be the wake-up call the Parliamentary Party needs to start getting to grips with this issue.
The truth is that if we had a proper media regulator, we wouldn’t need injunctions. The courts would seldom need to get involved, since people would have a proper means of redress through a dynamic and trustworthy PCC. Other regulators work perfectly well in this way, dismissing trivial or self-interested complaints and upholding those that have caused genuine and avoidable harm.
But in the present PCC we have a self-confessed ‘mediator’ rather than regulator, run by newspaper editors, whose primary job is to protect their colleagues. It regularly fails to enforce its own Code of Practice. The most notorious example of this was when it failed to properly investigate the phone-hacking scandal, and even attacked the Guardian for reporting on the story. Indeed, when the PCC learned of my conference motion, its chairman, Baroness Buscombe, tried to shoot it down in a lengthy article in the Lib Dem News (no link available).
Lib Dem MPs need to seize the initiative and call now for serious reform of this pathetic organisation; not to further restrict press freedom, but quite the reverse: to protect it from the threat of a statutory privacy law, or a the back-door privacy law we are currently witnessing that is taking place through the courts.
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25 Comments
I think we can’t get away from it. It is not for an MP to flout the law in the House of Commons
Absolutely spot on. The PCC is the root of the problems here. It needs to be made fully independent, placed on a proper regulatory footing, and given proper powers to enforce it’s code of conduct.
“call for serious reform of this pathetic organisation”
+1
@Edward – it is when it comes to freedom of speech. He wasn’t flouting the law, because parliamentary privilege is part of the law. It is precisely the job of MPs to speak up against the judiciary trying to hide their own judgments from us.
“It is precisely the job of MPs to speak up against the judiciary trying to hide their own judgments from us.”
The Judgement was not hidden.
No, I think you’ll find that Hemmings has _direct_ responsibility. I posted this at the tail end of another thread, so will do so at the top of this one:
Hemmings should be suspended.
I note also that an LDV author appears to be repeating the speculations of a judge that a private individual may have been attempting blackmail, despite this never even have been reported to the Police.
~alec
PS Please everyone stop referring to this as a superinjunction. It was not.
He wasn’t being denied the opportunity to do so. He could have requested an in camera discussion of this. But that would have meant he couldn’t get on television.
This wasn’t Trafigura.
~alec
Why would we want to hand over press freedom to an unelected , unaccountable body with power to censor the press?
Ferkin L, I agree with Simon. I need a lie down.
I honestly cannot see how the PCC can be said to have failed to honour the spirit of its code through this – as opposed to the phonehacking L’Affair Téléphone le Piratage – as there wasn’t an issue of concealment with the patent desire of the print media to publish.
~alec
@Simon
One example is that newspapers should prominently announce where previous stories have been incorrect or plain untrue. That does not seem an unreasonable encroachment on press freedom, and is something the PCC should do but fails to.
There’s also the problem of papers assuming defendants are guilty etc. but perhaps that’s a matter for the courts.
What about repeating uninvestigated suspicions of blackmail?
@alec – you’re right this wasn’t trafigura, but it was an attempt to bring proceedings against 75,000 twitter users and keep one person’s name secret whilst the other individual had been named and accused of many things.
No it wasn’t. Now, d’you agree with my hypotheticals?
You mean the blackmail suspicions? Those were bandied about mostly by those objecting to the original injunction.
File under ‘Double Standards, Hypocrisy’.
~alec
I thought the individual footballer in question had begun proceedings against twitter, which was why the MP in question felt the need to break the injunction? Forgive me if I am wrong, but it was the attempts to silence vast swathes of people from speaking that make this injunction harmful and made the MP seek to break it.
And I don’t see the significance or who bandied about those allegations (neither do I necessarily agree with your claim that ‘those were bandied about mostly by those objecting to the original injunction.’)
(btw you final few words look a bit aggressive, but I assume you are referrnig those who objected to the original injunction rather than me :-))
@Henry
“it is when it comes to freedom of speech. He wasn’t flouting the law, because parliamentary privilege is part of the law. It is precisely the job of MPs to speak up against the judiciary trying to hide their own judgments from us.”
Sorry but you’re wrong here. He was flouting the law but cannot be held to account for it due to privilege. Also at what point was the Giggs judgement hidden from you. Anyone can read it via Bailii (amongst other tools).
“but it was an attempt to bring proceedings against 75,000 twitter users and keep one person’s name secret whilst the other individual had been named and accused of many things.”
Again wrong. It was an attempt to find who began the twitter issue and to identify whether it was a journalist with a vested interest. If you read the judgments you think are hidden you will see why this was a very real fear due to the admission of one prominent member of the press of telling as many people as possible the details of cases where injunctions exist. Giggs could not bring proceedings for contempt of court.
The PCC is rubbish. The only thing that will make papers think twice will be if they have to give as many column inches, in the same position in the publication (over as many days) to retractions as to the original story. And that, if they could reasonably be expected to have known there was doubt to the veracity of the story in advance they should be fined an amount equal to the revenue from the offending publications. As right wing as this sounds let the punishments fit the offence.
Anything less and Murdoch and co are laughing and can continue to snoop into private lives where there is zero public interest. But as Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas, and as Cable lost his war, and Hemming appears to have chosen the other side to Vince we will be stuck with the rubbish that is the PCC.
Henry, you were wrong when you referred to this as a superinjunction. You were wrong when you said there was an attempt to hold 75,000 Twitterers to account (even if there were, lawyers can say whatever they like, it doesn’t make it real).
It is therefore reasonable to ask what you _do_ know about this case.
And I’m the Queen of Sheba. Now, once again, would you approve of Robert Thompson being identified or of British papers printing salacious details of the woman Dominique Strauss-Kahn is alleged to have raped?
I’m guessing not. In short, you, like Hemmings, believe you should be free to chose which rulings you abide by and which you ignore. Anyone wanting to follow the above course of action can do the same and you wouldn’t have a leg to stand on… until Hemmings is disciplined by the Party, the LibDems wouldn’t have a leg to stand on… until he is, at the very least, suspended from Parliament, Parliament doesn’t have a leg to stand on.
This is what you’re congratulating. Any more boxes you would like to open, Pandora?
Let’s say that Hemming was acting out of alturistic motives (instead of self-publicity and mischief-making): he should then accept the consequences, such as suspension.
But he won’t. Because he can’t. Because he is simply a cut-price Lembit Opik.
~alec
If anyone doubts the failures of the PCC then they need merely read one of the several excellent blogs which attempt to hold the press in this country to account. Tabloidwatch is a good one. And of course, the PCC never enforces its code and, when a newspaper is regularly ruled against by the PCC, it simply leaves as we have seen with the Daily Star and the Daily Express. Every other section of this country which has comparable power to the press it regulated properly. Why is there an exception in this case?
In any event, this is not a call for censorship of the press, it is a call for the press to be forced to abide by the code which they wrote to “self regulate” themselves and which they regularly flout. Is it too much to ask that the press be required to display the same level of accuracy as news programmes?
If you want an example of the case for the enforcement of the PCC code of conduct for all of the press, look no further than this: http://tabloid-watch.blogspot.com/2011/05/no-eu-plot-to-ban-shopping-bags.html
All the stuff about John Hemmings is a distraction from the main point – that we need a regulator that actually enforces the standards set out in the PCC’s own code of practise. That would solve the privacy debate at a stroke, without involving the courts.
No, Truro Joe… the moralizing about the PCC is a distraction from the contempt for law and Parliament which Hemmings demonstrated; not to mention the matter that his loudest supporters don’t appear to know the basics of the case. Even C4 News was refering to this as a superinjunction.
Now, could someone respond to my hypotheticals?
~alec
Alec, in your hypotheticals, those identities were kept secret as a matter of safety, not privacy. And the identities have not been leaked over the internet. That was the whole point of Hemming’s intervention – the law had become irrelevant in the Giggs case.
You’re looking for a loophole which aint there, Truro Joe. The situations do not make a sliding scale if illegalness. Hemmings chose which laws he wants to obey. You cannot get out of it.
As I said above to Henry… if someone chose to act out these hypothetics, you wouldn’t have a leg to stand on.
Until Hemmings is disciplined by the Party, it wouldn’t have a leg to stand on.
Until Hemmings is, at the very least, suspended by Parliament, it – the highest authority in the land – wouldn’t have a leg to stand on.
Also, given your Party’s pursuit of Labour MPs who beat their candidates, you can guarantee someone out there is looking for a way to unseat Hemmings.
Well done. I mean, well done. Really, really, really well done.
~alec
Whatever hypothetical cases are produced to show some great point of principle has been breached the reality is we have the familiar clichéd story of the footballer who can resist everything except temptation.
Hemmings named Ryan Giggs as a party in an affair. That’s what he did, that’s all he did. Building it into either a heroic stand for free speech or a scurrilous abuse of power does not advance the debate for either side.
The only point of principle I can find in these cases is one person’s right to privacy should not trump another’s right to tell their own story.
~*engages head*~
#bedpost#
~*engages head*~
#bedpost#
Kevin, there may be a distinction in your mind between the laws/regulations you want to obey and those you don’t, but those who want to disregard the laws/regulations you would wish to remain in place might not see it that way.
As you and others – not just limited to this thread – persist in referring to this as a superinjunction and that 75,000 Twitterers were being threatened, there is one of only two conclusions to draw. Either, youse are lying; or youse have minimal knowledge of the ruling and what Hemmings’ disregarding of it represents.
~alec