Untrusted, unaccountable and in an unhealthy relationship with the Government: Is the press a roadblock to a functional democracy?
by Alice Watkins
Hacked Off and Byline Times held a fringe event at the Labour Party Conference, to address what a future Labour Government might do to raise press standards.
The striking theme which emerged from the discussion was the power that the press continues to wield, and the urgent need for legislators to commit to press reform – to ensure that the public are protected from abuse of power.
Our panel of media experts and journalists were joined by two Labour MPs to deliver the discussion to a packed audience, at the Hilton Hotel, Liverpool.
Byline Times Editors, Peter Jukes, Hardeep Matharu and Political Editor Adam Bienkov were joined by journalist and Hacked Off board member Emma Jones, Political commentator Marina Purkiss along with Bell Ribeiro – Addy MP and Dawn Butler MP.
The panel made the case for press reform, reflecting on what has changed since Leveson first made his recommendations, following the unearthing of widespread phone hacking and blagging across the industry.
“The Leveson Inquiry didn’t change anything (in terms of how the press operates),” said host Peter Jukes – founder of Byline Times who reported on the Inquiry as well as the hacking trials.
“Most people thought I was crazy back then, (when I talked about) a malfunction in the fourth estate. We have the immune system of democracy, which is supposed to be journalism, corrupted.”
“Ten years on they know what I was talking about.”
In 2012, Leveson recommended incentives for newspapers to create and to join a truly independent press regulator but the Government failed to bring these into effect and cancelled the second part of the inquiry.
This came after fierce lobbying from press barons, who warned of a “chilling effect” on free speech and the demise of investigative reporting.
More than a decade later, most of Britain’s press remains effectively unregulated, allowing newspapers and their websites to publish falsehoods to millions of readers with impunity. Meanwhile, of those few outlets which have chosen to be independently regulated, there is no evidence of a “chill” on investigative reporting.
Hardeep Matharu, Editor of Byline Times, explained how the press in its current form makes any kind of progressive change more difficult.
“There has been a revolving door between the offices of The Spectator and 10 Downing Street. We need to look at the impact this has on our democracy. You cannot hold the press accountable if you are mixing in the same social circles and political groups, or if your interests have merged”.
“There are issues we need to look at, around who owns our newspapers and what interests are being advanced? Is it really the public interest? Or is it the private interests of very wealthy proprietors who may or may not pay taxes in this country.”
“We need to look at how the established media is an entire block in itself. It has a lot of power and it’s never really scrutinised,” says Hardeep.
“An example of a story, symbolic of these problems with our press is, when we broke the Dan Wootton story this summer – which was an open secret in the press, everyone knew about this for many years.Byline Times, along with The Guardian, The Mirror and other regional titles reported on this – that he was now under investigation- but within a few hours some of these articles were deleted, with no explanation”.
Dan Wootton is accused of ‘overseeing a culture of sexual harassment’ and being a ‘serial bully’ whilst he was editor at The Sun. The Former GB news presenter – who has also been a columnist for Mail Online since 2021, is currently under investigation by the Metropolitan police relating to allegations of the obtaining of sexual images by deception and blackmail. The investigation was launched into the broadcaster’s conduct over the past decade, following allegations made by colleagues of inappropriate behaviour.
Hardeep said, “People always argue that publishers don’t have much influence because circulation has dropped but that actually misses the point – it’s actually about the proprietors and the position of power,”.
Belle Ribeiro Addy MP pointed to the fundamental role of journalists, which is to hold power to account on behalf of the public.
She said, “We do have fantastic journalists in this country that hold onto the true meaning of what journalism is meant to be – if they are not going to do this across the board then they must face sanctions.
Otherwise we can only see things getting much worse in public life and a more toxic debate when it comes to politics”.
The MP believes that holding the power of the press to account should also fall under journalists remit.
“It is no longer the British press. Our media has become a plaything of overseas oligarchs, who pay no tax in this country and whose aim is to influence political outcomes in the country. Proprietors have extreme wealth which means they have real clout, more influence, way beyond what donating to a political party can”.
“The unavoidable truth is that these publications are never going to deviate from their billionaire owners – who have a corrosive influence on public life” she added.
Close relationships
Adam Bienkov, Political Editor of Byline Times explained how the lobby system impacts political reporting.
“There’s a secret society at the centre of the UK. It has hundreds of members, some household names. They have huge influence over our lives and operate over a secret code of behaviour. I’m not talking about the freemasons, I’m talking about the lobby” he said.
“But there is something masonic about this system”.
Adam explained that, despite efforts to make the lobby system more accountable, there were still elements of what was historically a secret society in place today.
“Yes, there are now a broader range of voices inside the lobby. There’s now more ethnic minority people. But it’s also become less arguably less socially representative.”
“But the system – because it’s based on secrecy (when it was first set up journalists couldn’t reveal their members of the lobby or reveal they had briefings from the prime minister’s spokesman) – there is still a condition in parliament that anything said is, by default, off the record and anonymous.”
“So politicians and officials know they can go to certain journalists and get their message out, attack their rivals and or even put out lies”.
Adam, who reported on the “Partygate” scandal, says the lobby system can warp coverage.
“For weeks and weeks the Prime Minister’s spokesman said nothing happened, everyone followed the rules, but parties were happening in the press offices inside 10 Downing Street.”
“Rather than resign, the Prime Minister’s spokesman issued a very brief apology for having lied to us and we all moved on”.
Belle Ribeiro Addy MP agrees that the relationship between politicians, press and police needs addressing.
She said, “From Hillsborough to Orgreave, we’ve seen journalists colluding with the powerful instead of telling the truth about what happened. The same was seen with Grenfell and Bloody Sunday – which involved arms of the state.”
“Victims are often victimised twice, with all sorts of slanders against people who can no longer answer back.”
“We know IPSO is a sham regulator, existing for nearly a decade without launching a single standards investigation and upholding less than 3% intrusion into grief complaints”.
Hacked Off board member and journalist Emma Jones believes press reform would allow reporters to act more responsibly, in their pursuit of the truth.
“Regulation is there for journalists as well. The fact newspapers are unregulated makes it more difficult to do your job as a reporter, it offers you no protection.”
“It’s difficult to have a voice because they are tough places to work. When I was working as a journalist I never saw the editors code”, she says.
“With the hacking scandal it wasn’t the bosses, the proprietors, the people who are still in charge of the news group who got the flack and ended up in prison. It was the smaller people, a group of “rogue reporters.”
“If newspapers signed up to an independent regulator it would be in their interests to work to a set of standards.”
Marina Purkiss is a political commentator, campaigner and podcaster, with over 400 thousand followers on Twitter. Marina launched her career online following the 2016 EU referendum and result of the US election.
“The reason for people like me on Twitter is because we looked around and saw a media landscape that wasn’t doing its job,” she said.
“There’s so much noise out there and my angle is always asking what’s relevant to people like me, who don’t understand the Westminster bubble.
“I try to pull out the bits which are going to be relevant to their lives… [to reveal] the scale of corruption, the suppression of democracy”.
Marina Purkiss said, “When you look at IPSO [the press complaints handler] they don’t do what they are supposed to do.
“We’re at a point within all of these different pillars of our media where the reward for lying is far greater than the punishment” she added.
Dawn Butler MP said she believes improving press standards would enhance the quality of information the public receive about critical issues.
She said, “If we don’t have safeguards around the news, around the truth. Where do we go to get the truth?”.
Marina Purkiss urged MPs to do more to address these issues within the press.
She said, “There needs to be a huge effort on Labour’s part and more bravery – because it’s changing the status quo – to make sure those regulators do their job”.
There’s a reason, we are still campaigning for the introduction of Leveson recommendations. We’re still seeing ordinary people’s lives destroyed by the press.
Following the meeting, our panellists were in agreement: that the next government must recognise the power and influence the press has and the extent to which this impacts our politics, the electorate, and wider society.
As citizens we must be informed accurately about critical issues, from public health concerns to the impact of climate breakdown because this information affects the decisions we make each day. Journalists provide a public service, so therefore must operate to a set of standards. Without effective and independent regulation of the industry, there’s nothing keeping the power of the press in check.