Phone Hacking

Debate between Chris Bryant and Anna Soubry

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

I concur absolutely, and I am sure that that sentiment is echoed across the House.

Such is my concern—I have been persuaded by much of what I have heard today—that I think there must now be a pause in the consideration of the matter that has been referred to and will be determined by Ofcom. I urge the Secretary of State to consider whether we should pause things, given what has happened.

In the time remaining, I want to return to the subject of my private Member’s Bill. I am not sure whether it falls within the remit of the public inquiry, but I hope that the Government will consider changing the law. I believe that the press has lost the moral plot and I say that with a heavy heart because before I went back to the Bar I trained as a journalist and worked as one for many years. I am proud to be a member of the National Union of Journalists and I was mother of the chapel at Central in Nottingham. I look on my brothers and sisters at a national level with, frankly, despair. It is important to remind ourselves that small local papers are very different from national papers—

[Chris Bryant]

Any in particular?

[Anna Soubry]

I cannot hear the hon. Gentleman’s sedentary intervention, which is probably a good thing.

In all seriousness, it is right and fair to say that all of us know from our considerable experience that local papers act properly and responsibly. We all enjoy a perfectly proper relationship with them—a relationship that has not been enjoyed between other politicians and national newspapers, which is a situation that must change.

It comes down to this: if people did not buy these newspapers, we would not have this problem. Too many people have an insatiable appetite for gossip, trivia, scandal and the scum of life and that is why we have found ourselves in this position. If people did not buy such papers—I hope that on Sunday the News of the World will get its real punishment through a complete and total slump in its sales—we would effectively see the sort of regulation and change that we all want. There must be a huge cultural shift not only in how we deal with newspapers but in how they conduct themselves. They should act in a much better and more responsible manner in future.