Media Standards (Hansard, 9 June 1999)

§ Mr. George Galloway (Glasgow, Kelvin)

I must declare an interest, although I do so with some trepidation in the presence of my hon. Friend the Minister for Tourism, Film and Broadcasting. As the Register of Members' Interests shows, I myself am a journalist—a newspaper columnist, nowadays on The Mail on Sunday and the Catholic newspaper Flourish. I hope that my hon. Friend will accept it from me that, on at least one of those newspapers, my own views are not always necessarily the views of the management.

I should start by saying what my speech is not about, for there has been some media interest in that. It is not about outlining a litany of complaints about my own experiences with the media; there is not enough time for that. Regardless, I know the way to the libel courts, and am represented by Davenport Lyons-the legendary "Sue, Grabbit and Runne" of Private Eye fame. Besides, some of those experiences are more hurtful than others.

My last close encounter with the gutter press consisted of a 6 ft-tall young Cuban mulatta, purchased by the News of the World to say—in colour, on pages 1, 2 and 3—that I was good looking & had a good body for my age & and did it with her five times a night under the Caribbean stars. That is the type of slander that some of us have to put up with.

Neither is my speech about making a case against self-regulation, for Government intervention, for new legislation on privacy, or about anything like that. I am one of the very few surviving opponents of the last attempt at a privacy law—which was piloted by the least plausible advocate of such a thing, the former Member for Winchester, Mr. John Browne.

I have not changed my mind since then about the fact that there is no editor so venal that I should prefer to see a Minister—any Minister of any Government-sitting in that editor's chair, or making his or her editorial decisions. I have visited too many countries where the deadest hand on freedom is that of the censor—the Minister of Information, the proverbial "Minister for Truth"to wish to see us go even an inch down that road.

It is, moreover, not true that the current arrangements, in the form of the Press Complaints Commission, are a failure. In fact, in the first decade of the PCC's existence, four fifths of all complaints have been resolved bilaterally between newspaper and complainant. While, of course, there can always be improvements—I have some suggestions to make in that regard—our system of self-regulation is currently being studied by many people around the world who are trying to balance the precious, indeed fundamental, freedom of the press with the need to avoid cruel and gratuitous intrusion. Tomorrow, at the Law Society, in Chancery lane, representatives of 20 press councils, from Estonia to Iceland, will be conferring on the best way of reconciling those matters, and will very much use the British experience as a suitable case for study.

Lately, several controversies have clearly generated a great deal of heat. However, there has been more heat than light. In the murk, some people have suggested changes to 760 the self-regulatory framework which, while superficially attractive, do not really stand up to scrutiny. Some people, including noble Friends in the other place, seem to favour a "proactive PCC", which could trigger investigations itself, rather than being dependent on an alleged victim of abuse of the code making a complaint. However, that in itself could be an intrusion.

Many people—such as the comedian Harry Enfield, whose honeymoon was crudely interrupted by British tabloid paparazzi; or my hon. Friend the Member for Stevenage (Barbara Follett), whose holiday was similarly marred—despite their justifiable anger, have no wish to prolong their agony or widen the audience for their embarrassment by making a complaint. Moreover, it would clearly represent a type of double jeopardy if the PCC, acting in what it thought was the public good, were to ride unasked to their defence. Regardless, such people could well be on their way to the libel courts, or have others reasons why they do not wish to become a "proactive PCC" cause celebre.

A more engaged PCC more closely in tune with the industry and public attitudes and with a more hands-on chairman would be a good idea. I mean no disrespect to Lord Wakeham when I say that he is rather a figure from another age. Given that, among many other duties, he heads the royal commission investigating the future shape of the upper House of the British Parliament, he must be one of the country's busiest men. It would be preferable to have someone more steeped in the argot of the British press who would have more of a common and political touch, from which the standing of the PCC in the country would benefit.

There is also a case to answer in that some victims of abuse of the code are afraid to register a complaint for fear that the tabloids will vindictively pursue them. The code needs adjusting to make it clear that any such vindictive pursuit of a complainant would seriously exacerbate a newspaper's position and would be the subject of more serious sanction.

Similarly, the code needs to take account of the recidivist behaviour of some newspapers under some editors. It is surely unacceptable for breach after breach of the code to occur, with punishment no more severe than the publication of an adjudication tucked away on page 32 of the paper. The PCC should adopt a "three strikes and you're out" approach. If a newspaper was found on a second occasion in 12 months to have broken the code to which it had voluntarily subscribed, it should be required to publish the adjudication on the front page with an apology from the proprietor and the editor. If a third breach occurred within 12 months—we should remember that each editor is required in their contract of employment to comply with the code—it should be incumbent on the proprietor to dismiss the editor.

The code and the PCC are most seriously falling short of public expectation in what can loosely be described as entrapment. There are all kinds of entrapment for all kinds of purposes. Few would dispute that The Sunday Times was justified in its entrapment of Members of this House found to be accepting cash payments for asking parliamentary questions, or that The Guardian was right to deploy a cod fax to help get to the bottom of who really paid Jonathan Aitken's hotel bill at the Ritz. Not all subterfuge should be frowned on, but there must be a clear and undeniable public interest that overrides most people's natural queasiness about such tactics. Above all, 761 there must be no active commissioning of wrong-doing that would not otherwise have taken place. As we shall see, that is by no means always the case.

I shall concentrate on one newspaper—the aforementioned News of the World—and two cases in particular. One involves a minor celebrity who is now a guest of Her Majesty's prison service. The other involves a previously unknown couple, Sue and Bob, the owners of a two-star naturist English boarding house. Many of us must have been intrigued over the years about whether the famously intrepid News of the World investigators really made their excuses and left the scenes of depravity that they were helpfully bringing to our attention. Sue and Bob, armed with audio and visual aids, answered that question, at least as far as the chief crime reporter of the News of the World, Neville Thurlbeck, was concerned. After he had plastered on a double-page spread a story entitled "The guesthouse where all rooms come with en suite pervert", he was unmasked by the couple's videotape as the pervert who badgered, begged and finally bribed Bob and Sue into allowing him to indulge in a rather pathetic act of onanism at the foot of their bed.

Despite the News of the World being caught bang to rights in that case, the PCC refused even to consider the couple's complaint in one of its most spineless failures of the decade. The presence on the board of the PCC of Mr. Phil Hall, the editor of the News of the World, scarcely persuaded those two private citizens that self-regulation would do it for them.

Even more serious is the case of the minor television actor, John Alford, from the series "London's Burning". He is currently serving a prison sentence for supplying 2g of cocaine, having been entrapped by the chief investigative editor of the News of the World, Mahzer Mahmood. Mahmood posed, as is his habit, as an Arab prince with a retinue of followers. I know some Arab princes—some are my friends—and Mahzer Mahmood is no Arab prince. He was dismissed by The Sunday Times for dishonesty and for seeking to persuade workmates to behave dishonestly in order to cover up his misdemeanours. Nevertheless, that man is given apparently unlimited budgets to trap a long succession of dupes, from the directors of Newcastle United football club to young and greedy actors such as John Alford.

Mahmood took a suite in the Savoy hotel and dressed in the clothes of a prince of Arabia. For more than two weeks, he seduced Alford, chauffeuring him around in his hired Rolls-Royce and laying before him the mirage of the riches of Croesus, which could be his just for being the prince's friend and appearing at a non-existent festival in the Gulf.

Finally, when he had Alford eating out of his hand, he popped the question and asked if Alford knew where he could get some cocaine. As Alford said in his speech from the dock, he would never have dreamed of making this transaction if his friend, the Arab prince, whom he thought was going to be the making of him, had not asked him to do so. He said, and he was surely right, that the News of the World had manufactured the crime rather than reported it. Mahmood got his story and young Alford got a jail sentence and the ruination of his professional and, who knows, even his personal life.

762 Surely the entrapment of people into committing offences is a matter for the criminal law and a matter for the Government to consider seriously. The law was an ass when it imprisoned John Alford, and justice was not done.

Of course, there is a great deal of hypocrisy in the press about the taking of recreational drugs. I could, if I were minded, draw the House's attention to important luminaries of the fourth estate who are no strangers to such illicit substances. There is something especially piquant about Mr. Murdoch's newspapers' resorting to these extraordinary lengths to prove that the most obscure individuals, whom they ludicrously dub as "role models", indulge themselves in this way.

Let me tell the House about Mr. Matthew Freud. I understand that he is now a successful public relations man and friend of the famous. Back in the 1980s, Mr. Freud found himself in the dog house, in front of a judge who fined him £500 and told him he was a "very foolish young man" for supplying 3.19g of a powder containing cocaine.

Mr. Murdoch, nowadays a papal knight, must have discovered the importance of penitence and redemption, at least as it affects his family. The same Mr. Freud is now the consort and live-in lover of Miss Elizabeth Murdoch who will one day inherit the very same News of the World in which princes of the press such as Mahzer Mahmood get high, laying in wait for fools whom they can entrap into supplying them with their powders.

In conclusion, I turn to the latest and arguably the greatest blunder by the tabloids—the sensational splash of seaside pictures of Sophie Rhys-Jones. That gross and tasteless act, in this case by another of Mr. Murdoch's flagships, The Sun, was a good old-fashioned story of personal betrayal, chequebook journalism and grotesque editorial misjudgment.

Far from having a melancholy ending, I believe that the humiliating climbdown by the editor of The Sun, David Yelland, was a triumph of the most important and safest form of sanction against unworthy journalism: the power of the people. The wave of angry public disapproval and the concentrated fire of the more respectable press secured quick and spectacular justice for the blameless Miss Rhys-Jones. People voting with their feet and their pockets against such journalism will always be the way of dragging the rudest red-top papers back out of the gutter.

§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Janet Anderson)

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Kelvin (Mr. Galloway) on securing tonight's debate. I note that he says that the views of the newspapers for which he writes do not always coincide with his own. He also said that he would not dwell on his own experience at the hands of the media because we did not have sufficient time. For the same reason, I will not dwell on my experience of the media.

I am not the first Minister to respond to a debate in the House on the issue and I am sure that I will not be the last. I am only sorry that there are not more members of the press present to hear tonight's important debate.

Recent behaviour of certain sections of the press has provoked concerns in the House and renewed, in some quarters, calls for greater controls on the press. I also 763 know that many in the House are of the view that sections of the press have recently gone way beyond the spirit and the letter of the Press Complaints Commission's code of practice, and I have some sympathy with those views. However, my hon. Friend will agree that we must avoid knee-jerk responses. As we have all too often seen in the past, such responses rarely, if ever, result in an effective solution to a perceived problem.

We should also remind ourselves that a free press remains the cornerstone of our democracy. Quite simply, we cannot have a free democratic society without a free press.

We can justifiably be proud of a long tradition of press freedom in this country. Since 1696, there has been no Executive intervention in the content of newspapers in peacetime. Newspapers are, and should remain, independent of government. It should be for the press to decide what and what not to publish, subject to the general law.

The press has frequently demonstrated that it is a powerful force for good in our society and the Government are committed to preserving the freedom necessary for it to fulfil its proper role. That is why we have repeatedly stated our preference for self-regulation—a position that my hon. Friend will support. We have expressed reluctance to introduce statutory regulation or a privacy law. At present, the Government have no plans, nor see any pressing reason, to introduce legislation to regulate the press.

Under the present system of self-regulation, the Press Complaints Commission seeks to conciliate between those who are aggrieved about alleged press abuses and the newspaper concerned, and, where that fails, to adjudicate according to a code of practice that has been agreed by the newspaper and magazine industry.

The code, to which my hon. Friend referred, covers many different issues, including intrusion into privacy, intrusion into grief or shock, opportunity to reply, payment for articles and, above all, inaccuracy. The PCC published a revised code of practice on 19 December 1997, with increased safeguards against intrusion and harassment, and protections for children. Most of the matters are not covered by the criminal or civil law, and thus the present arrangements give people an avenue of complaint that would not otherwise be available and which is fairly rapid and free. It is important to note that the great majority of those who complain to the PCC are satisfied with the outcome.

That is not to say that the Government believe that self-regulation is working perfectly. The Government expect the press to abide by the rules and commitments enshrined in the code of practice, and we continue to review the effectiveness of press self-regulation by monitoring alleged press abuses and the PCC's handling of them.

764 Ministers and my officials are in regular contact with the PCC to discuss a number of issues. The Government have repeatedly stated our desire to see further improvements to self-regulation. We have no hesitation in suggesting such improvements to both the PCC's operations and the code, as and when we think necessary. I thank my hon. Friend for his contribution to that process.

From my discussions with the noble Lord Wakeham, I know that he welcomes this continuing dialogue, and he is always open to considering suggested improvements to the code. However, we should recognise that any improvements are likely to be most effective if they are made with the general consent of the press. I do not underestimate the difficulty of achieving that.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this important issue. I recognise that the behaviour of certain elements of the press has, in recent weeks, caused concern and distress to many—my hon. Friend mentioned some of those instances—but I do not believe that that should lead us to conclude that the time for statutory regulation is right. In my view, self-regulation continues to be the best way in which to ensure high editorial standards in this country. Let us not forget that, despite the occasional lapse, the history of the press over the last decade or so has been, by and large, one of continued responsible improvement.

The Government continue to be committed to monitoring the effectiveness of the current self-regulatory system. I thank my hon. Friend again for his suggestions and comments on the code, breaches of the code and possible punishment for such breaches, and I thank him particularly for what he says about entrapment, about which there has been great concern in recent weeks.

I noted with interest what my hon. Friend said about whether the PCC should be able to initiate its own investigations without a complaint being made to it, and he made a valid point in support of the present system. Recent events will feed into the continuing monitoring process that the Government will carry out in terms of the effectiveness of the system. In my opinion, the basic rationale for self-regulation has not been damaged by those recent events.

I conclude by quoting from an editorial in The Observer on 30 May, which said: A free press, warts and all, is an indispensable component of democracy. If we some saw some warts last week, don't forget that wider truth. In what has been a difficult few weeks for the press, that is a sentiment with which I hope most hon. Members can concur. Once again, I thank my hon. Friend for raising this important issue. I assure him that we will take note of everything that he said during the debate.