Leveson Inquiry

Lord Rooker Excerpts

Friday 11th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rooker]

My Lords, I have not spoken on this issue previously. I am in favour of a free press unshackled by Parliament or government. In fact, I want an even freer press, but where privacy laws are not needed. Privacy laws will be misused by the rich and famous to cover up. We should not have laws that look like they are only for celebs to be able to collect loads of money.

We need to respond on behalf of the majority of people living in an alert democracy who want facts, opinions and lots of open comments. They are not fools and can make their own minds up, but they need to be able to complain and not be fobbed off. If they are on the receiving end of an untruth, they want the chance for an apology and a correction. If they see an untruth they should be able to complain. They need someone to listen. They want someone to go to who is not owned and controlled, lock stock and barrel, by those they complain about. A regulator that is both independent and objective will help people with a complaint and, as the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said, decent journalists who themselves want to be held to high standards. Over the next 18 months or two years, we will witness a great number of court cases where journalists, the police and others are held to account under the existing law. Everything we will witness came about under the existing, press-owned self-regulation process.

In preparing these few words, I read the 2012 Hugh Cudlipp lecture given by Jon Snow of Channel 4. Jon said that he never met that giant of post-war tabloid journalism but he mused about what Cudlipp would have made of today’s tabloid leadership: not a lot, I suspect. I met Hugh Cudlipp and his team in 1962, when he came to talk to the annual student journalist conference, and the year after when we persuaded him to address students at Aston University. He electrified us to go for those in power, search out what they were about and what they were up to, and remember that newspapers are about the people. Today, it appears that some press barons and journalists have removed themselves from the real world where the majority of people live. They have contempt for those they write about and take their readers for fools. Jon Snow said that the hacks in question who brought about Leveson,

“took some weird pleasure in urinating on our world”.

We need a regulator that people and journalists can trust; a regulator that above all knows what it is doing; a regulator that is objective, trustworthy and independent; and a regulator that editors do not fear if they print stories that are right in truth and justified. Snow pointed out—not much has been made of this—that the cutting edge of TV journalists are subject to regulation that seems quite effective. They can work within the so-called constraints that might be there. He also spoke about not wanting to find his own editors somewhere in the mix. Decent journalists want a system with an objective regulator but they would not want it presided over by their own editors.

Public trust is crucial. Lord Justice Leveson showed the way to engender that. Like him, I favour independent, objective self-regulation to maximise the buy-in. It is crucial that the buy-in is maximised but there is a need to give the regulator the kitemark from time to time to engender and preserve public trust. Who is to award the kitemark that the regulator is indeed objective, trustworthy and independent? Leveson also gave us the answer to that, which is dawning on people slowly. Contrary to the claims of editors and some Ministers, no parliamentary or government regulation of the press is required to achieve the solution in which the public will find trust. I will support the proposed recognition commission. Its only remit is to certify the regulation process—nothing to do with the press process, nothing to do with press content and nothing to do with the management of complaints. Therefore I support recommendations 1 to 24 of Lord Justice Leveson.