Data Protection Bill [Lords]

Debate between Andy Slaughter and Richard Drax

Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)]

It is a genuine pleasure to speak under your chairmanship after your absence, Mr Deputy Speaker. Welcome back; it is lovely to see you here.

I was a journalist for 17 years: five with the local press, two with the local media and ending up with 10 years at the BBC. I therefore have an interest in this debate, particularly in the Lords amendments, with which I entirely disagree.

In my very brief speech—time is pressing—I would like to take the House back to the royal charter. Everyone in the House will remember that all parties agreed at the time that, as a consequence of the phone hacking, there should be a royal charter. I have been in this place only seven years so I am still a whippersnapper in that sense, but I have always been very concerned when parties on both sides of the House agree with something. It normally means that something is dramatically wrong. Fifteen MPs voted against the royal charter. I and 14 others realised that there was some state control or state implication that would interfere with the free press. We were not happy with that, so we voted against it.

The key point—a point that I have yet to hear from any party on either side of the House—is that phone hacking is illegal. People are not allowed to do it, and as some journalists have found, they go to jail if it is done. Now, I do not want to take away from those who have suffered or the victims of phone hacking, including the royal family, of course. It was simply appalling. As a former—I would like to think—honourable journalist I personally never took part in that activity; nor did I know anyone who did. This is another point: phone hacking was done by a tiny minority of journalists, who were wrong and who caused immense damage to the reputation of the press in this country.

In my very humble opinion, the press in this country is one of the cornerstones of our freedom and democracy. As I have discovered in the short time that I have been here, when we tinker with legislation it is all too often a huge sledgehammer to crack a nut. Those who are introducing legislation and those who are debating it often do not think about its consequences. What would happen if we started to impede and encroach on the freedom of the press? The press understandably reacted with anger, claiming that the royal charter would destroy local papers who simply could not afford it. As my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Peter Heaton-Jones) said—this is true and quite extraordinary—section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013 forced newspapers that had not signed up to a state-supported regulator to pay their own and, indeed, their opponent’s legal costs in libel cases, even if they won the case. That is not freedom of the press. It is not even fair law. It is bad law, made on the back of a terrible wrong committed by a very few people in what is generally, across the world, a highly respected business or profession—that is, the press in this country.

I have been the victim of some pretty interesting press reporting. I confess that I have been trying to put some solar panels on my land. I remember that one columnist in the Daily Mail wrote a double-page spread that was inaccurate. Having read it, I felt as though I had almost murdered someone. I was somehow this appalling landowner who wanted to do these appalling things. I had imposed my will on my tenants, crushed debate and all these things, but none of it was true. In fact, the opposite had been true and always is in that case. To be fair, the paper did ask me for a comment but I knew that, were I to comment, it would be a small piece at the bottom right of the article, and that the other two and a half, three or four columns would all be anti-Drax. But I can live with that because I want a free press in this country. I want a free press to hold us, businesses and powerful people—yes, like Mr Mosley—to account. If I were in the wrong, the press would have a right to dig out of me what I had done wrong, even though I might not want them to do so.

[Andy Slaughter]

Does the hon. Gentleman think that people such as the McCanns, Milly Dowler’s family and Christopher Jefferies should live with the consequences of being traduced and victimised by the press? Does he not feel that casting the press as the victims, when we know that they are actually controlled by a small number of extremely wealthy and irresponsible individuals, is putting things exactly upside down?

[Richard Drax]

Forgive me, I did not quite hear the first part of the hon. Gentleman’s question, but I think that I got the general gist. The point about multimillion pound media barons is a red herring. I have worked in many media institutions, including newspapers and other organisations, and those people do not get involved. We were left very much to our own devices to report accurately, fairly and truthfully. Yes, they may be very wealthy, but good luck to them. They—or their fathers or grandfathers —have worked extremely hard to build up a business that employs tens of thousands of people in this country.

The point must again be made that the online media in this country—[Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne), who I seem to recall told us that there was no money left, groans from a sedentary position. Online, anyone can say what they want, and they do. There is no recourse for the many thousands of victims of online abuse, intimidation and threats—threats to kill. What comeback is there for them? Nothing at all. That is where I urge the Government to look very carefully to ensure that the online media face the same standards that the national press would face.

I am not going to keep the House waiting much longer, because others want to speak. It is my view—along with others, I would think—that only those with anger, revenge or even guilt in their heart would support these amendments and damage a free press, which is the cornerstone of our democracy. The Leader of the Opposition wants to crush the press; I think, “We’re coming for you” is what he said. No, that is not what the British people want and they certainly will not vote for it. A free press is all important.