Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill

Lord Soley Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2013 Lords Chamber

It is a compromise and no one should claim anything more, but it gives us the opportunity of a new beginning and an end to the deep misconduct which has affected some newspapers. It deserves support and, above all, I hope that the press will now co-operate in making it a success.

[Lord Soley]

I do not wish to delay the House very long but I have a very long history as regards this matter. I want to make only three brief points. First, as the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, has said, this is a compromise. It was not the first that I would have come to but the negotiations have led to it being much better. I certainly do not want to make the best the enemy of the good. This is good. That leads me to my second point. It is profoundly important that all Members of both Houses give the agreement as much support as possible in order to convey to the media that this is the will of the people of this country speaking through their Parliament.

As the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, has indicated, it has been the job of the press to hold power to account. But one of the things that have gone wrong over the past 40 or 50 years is that the power of the press has been abused in too many cases. They have done some wonderful work and there are some wonderful journalists but some journalists have betrayed that trust. Some editors and owners have also betrayed it and it became the abuse of power. That abuse of power had to be held to account. I have given evidence to many committees and I produced my own Bill some 20 or so years ago, which tried to draw attention to this issue. Getting to this point has been a long, hard journey and we should all be grateful.

In many respects, my final point is the most important. I would almost plead with the press to recognise that this is an opportunity for a change in the culture of the press. What let the press down was an acceptance of standards, attitudes and values within the press that would not have been tolerated outside the press. They let themselves down in that way and not enough of them—although, very credibly, one or two journalists have been particularly outstanding—challenged it. Now, we need to put that behind us and to say that the culture of the press can change.

The press should recognise that people have rights and that the freedom of the press was an extension of the freedom of speech and the freedom of association, which allowed people to meet together and to put forward their views. That was dangerously undermined when the phrase “press barons” came in somewhere around the end of the 19th century. That was something different from the press freedom for which people had previously fought. The press barons need to be held to account. We have taken a step in the direction that allows that to happen. If the press have the right approach to this, it will be an opportunity for a new start for everyone. I for one would be willing to sign up to that.

[Baroness Hollins]

With freedom comes responsibility and that is what this is all about. It is extraordinary what has happened to this debate in the 100 days since Lord Justice Leveson’s rigorous report was published. For a time, the debate descended into what the Guardian last week described as,

“bipartite discussions between Conservative ministers and newspapers”.

Then it returned to public debate via the anachronism of the royal charter. But at last an agreement has been reached by all three parties recognising what has been clear to the victims of press abuse from the beginning—this is not party political but a cross-party matter.

I congratulate the leaders of all three parties on reaching an historic agreement to put the building blocks in place to enable the establishment and recognition of an independent and effective press regulator. Before Lord Justice Leveson reported, many people assumed that he would recommend a statutory body to hold the press to the standards they profess to believe in and statutory compulsion for newspapers to join it. However, Lord Justice Leveson did no such thing. Instead, he recommended that the press be given yet another chance to set up their own voluntary self-regulator. Some victims were taken aback but accepted this as the result of careful and diligent public inquiry. The only thing he did ask—perhaps it is the very least he could have asked—was for a body to be set up in law which would from time to time scrutinise whether the industry’s new body met certain tests of independence and effectiveness. He said that those news publishers that met those standards should have benefits in law to give newspapers an incentive to join. He carefully set out some recommendations to ensure that any new body was a real regulator and not just a beefed-up version of the Press Complaints Commission—a new body that would be independent of those it regulates and committed to upholding standards for the benefit of the public. These recommendations now seem to be faithfully reflected in the royal charter, as they are in the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and in the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, which may not now be needed. The issue of exemplary damages will also need to be dealt with.

Some editors have argued at every opportunity to weaken these requirements. However, as set out in these amendments, if the industry sets up a regulator that meets Lord Justice Leveson’s criteria, the recognition body would recognise it. If it does not meet the criteria, it would not be recognised. It is as simple as that. I have no doubt about the sincerity of those who said that the Press Complaints Commission was effective or of those who say that a new regulator could be established without this mild level of scrutiny. But the time for take-my-word-for-it regulation is over.

Your Lordships know that my family was deeply affected by the unrestrained power of the press to intrude and to distort. The fact is that I have been hesitant about speaking out on this issue for fear of the consequences for my family. This is some proof, if it were needed, that the issue is not about individual free speech but about institutional power—power which is so concentrated in the hands of a few that it can be used to undermine good journalism and good journalists.

I too respect Sir Harold Evans, an editor of high reputation, for having the courage to point out what he called the “amazingly gross distortion” of the Leveson report by his former colleagues in Fleet Street. There has been so much distortion and so little reason to trust. Very senior people appeared to have gone back on their word on this issue, seemingly breaking promises solemnly made to people who have been badly hurt. For all these reasons, it is essential that this amendment and the royal charter succeed. They offer a vital guarantee that Leveson will be implemented in full.

In an earlier debate, the noble Lord, Lord Alli, pointed out that sometimes leadership must come from the Back Benches. Noble Lords on all sides rose to that challenge. Speaking for myself and, I believe, for many others, I am grateful to those on all Benches who saw and acted on the need for reform and I should like to take this opportunity to thank noble Lords for supporting victims of press abuse. I would also like to place on record my thanks to Hacked Off for representing and supporting victims and for its tireless work which has helped to bring truth to power.

While the abuses of power from press companies have saddened and sometimes shaken us, the best journalism makes us all proud. I believe that the royal charter agreed today offers the best chance to ensure much more good journalism in the future.