Safety of Journalists

Claire Hanna Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Claire Hanna (Belfast South) (SDLP) [V]]

As colleagues have said, a free press is integral to democracy and fundamental to ensuring that a society is underpinned by transparency and accountability. At the heart of that is ensuring that journalists are free and safe to do their jobs unhampered and without fear of intimidation or attack.

At home in Northern Ireland, unfortunately, attacks on journalists are not new and have not been confined to the past. This is a society that has always had a sick seam of coercion and intimidation and, unfortunately, that did not disappear with the Good Friday agreement. The last year has seen an alarming rise in the number of violent threats against journalists. Intimidation and threats are exacerbated by a poor legal climate, including overdue libel reform, the vexatious use of injunctions and, indeed, the landmark case against investigative journalists Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey over their treatment of the Loughinisland massacre.

An NUJ report from 2020 highlighted some of the attacks that journalists have experienced physically, verbally and online. It is not hyperbole to say that this is among the most dangerous places in the western world to be a journalist, and that has consequences for public debate. These threats come primarily from paramilitaries and the paramilitary-adjacent, who, in 2021, continue to exert undue influence and coercive control, intimidating communities and silencing those journalists who seek to expose them.

In the last year, alongside relentless on and offline intimidation of several journalists, a Sunday World reporter was issued with a credible threat against her newborn baby. A Belfast Telegraph photojournalist was beaten up and called a “Fenian” at loyalist riots this Easter. A member of the “Panorama” team was forced to flee his home after reporting on a notorious crime gang. And, of course, April 2019 saw the murder of journalist Lyra McKee by dissident republicans—the bloody and devastating consequence of bringing guns and disorder on to the streets.

We cannot talk about the safety of journalists and the freedom of the press without addressing the issue of paramilitarism and organised crime in Northern Ireland. It is still a reality of everyday life for many communities and journalists. It is welcome that the Government have stated their commitment to press freedom and that the Foreign Secretary will continue, he says, to hold to account

“those who repress, block & intimidate journalists”.

The question is: will this include Northern Ireland? Will the Government commit to ensuring that journalists are able to do their job in safety? Will they ask why, decades after the Good Friday agreement had ceasefired and paramilitaries had ceased to exist their emblems are allowed to fly on lamp posts across the city I live in? Why are they courted and empowered by public bodies, including this Government, who met loyalist paramilitary representatives to discuss post-Brexit arrangements? A cross-party and cross-civil society group has made it clear that no group can be allowed to undermine the freedom of the press and public interest reporting.

Online Anonymity and Anonymous Abuse

Claire Hanna Excerpts

Wednesday 24th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Claire Hanna (Belfast South) (SDLP) [V]]

I thank all Members on both sides of the House who are working together to address this issue.

As many people live increasingly online, never more so than during the past year, it is time to get serious about making the online world safer and protecting pluralism, democracy and the mental health of the many people who engage online. As I suspect most Members will know, particularly female Members, online abuse from anonymous accounts has sadly become part of daily life for most roles in public life. Social media is a vital tool for engagement, to listen as well as to broadcast, so it is a problem when people have to wade through pointless abuse, perhaps gendered, sectarian or racist, particularly from accounts that appear to have been set up for precisely that reason.

Although there are tools to report and block accounts, it usually has to be done by the victim of abuse, after the abuse has been experienced and the damage done. This has a cumulative effect, and it is easy to see how it is being harnessed politically in something of a war of attrition against opposing political voices. This is a new manifestation of a phenomenon familiar in Northern Ireland and elsewhere, of low-level, persistent abuse and intimidation that is designed to wear down an opponent to the extent that they decide that expressing a particular viewpoint just is not worth the hassle.

Misinformation is an additional and pressing concern with far-reaching consequences, whether through sowing distrust and hate or more literal and immediate impacts, as with systematic misinformation about the covid-19 pandemic. Most concerning of all is the harmful impact that anonymous abuse can have on young or vulnerable people. Research shows that bullying and receiving content they wish they had not seen is widespread among young people, and it is mainly sent by people who are not prepared to attach their own name. We have heard tragic stories of online bullying of adults and young people—bullying that may continue 24 hours a day, following people into their homes and bedrooms, in a way that is impossible to escape.

I welcome the moves in the online harms Bill towards greater regulation and against anonymity where it is used for harmful purposes. Many Members have outlined some of the reasons why people may choose and need to act anonymously, but the internet is essentially a large public space with an antisocial behaviour problem. We design and shape our physical environment to promote safety. If the companies have failed to do that, the Government should step in. Slightly tangentially, Australia’s regulation of news content shows that, although it is an international problem, national Governments can tackle it.

The online world is a great place to engage, communicate and connect, but we need action now to harness it for good and to protect vulnerable people and pluralism.

Covid-19: Cultural and Entertainment Sectors

Claire Hanna Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Claire Hanna (Belfast South) (SDLP) [V]]

I am glad to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate and to advocate on behalf of the arts and entertainment sector in Northern Ireland which, in common with those elsewhere, has been profoundly disrupted by covid and has a long path back to normality and recovery. Typically, a venue needs to fit in 50% to 70% of capacity for a show to be viable, and that is unlikely to be safe for some time to come, so the sector is not going to be able to throw open the doors and bounce back to normal any time soon.

I welcome the additional funding throughout the year, but that and future funding will have to be underpinned by timely decisions and flexibility by the Northern Ireland Executive. The current emergency funding is being undermined by the structures of accounting periods, with groups getting very welcome cash injections but windows of just a couple of months in which to spend them. This means we require flexibility around existing and future funding and, going forward, a multi-annual framework that will address the chronic underfunding of arts in Northern Ireland which, at just £5.31 per head, compares unfavourably with Wales, at £10.03, or the equivalent of £12.79 in the Republic of Ireland.

We need a recovery strategy that acknowledges the value of the arts to the economy and its full ecosystem, as well as the intrinsic value of the arts, and that understands that future sector-wide reconstruction and redeployment would be far costlier than a rescue package and managed recovery right now. People who are being forced out of work in the arts because of these challenging years have skills that it will not be easy to replace.

I have spoken before about the gaps in the support for the self-employed and about how the sector is based on collaboration and short-term projects so is almost casualised by definition. I welcome hints that furlough will be extended in the Budget tomorrow, but I urge the Chancellor to ensure that the self-employed in the sector—including part-timers, PAYE freelancers and others—for whom solutions have been identified are addressed.

I welcome the calls from other Members about theatre tax relief, which is a tool to help people who are producing this year. I hope it is extended to digital—the safe platform that many are able to access this year. I support calls for mobility for artists around Europe. The devastating consequences of that issue are being masked by covid.

Seo Seachtáin na Gaeilge in Éireann, ó thuaidh agus ó theas. Seo seans againn ár dteanga agus ár gcultúir agus ár n-ealaoín a cheilúradh agus thig le gach duine sult a bhaint as—finally, it is Irish Language Week in Ireland, north and south, which is an opportunity to celebrate the value of language to culture and the arts in a way that can be enjoyed by everybody. Go raibh maith agat.