Leveson Inquiry

Ian Paisley Excerpts

Monday 3rd December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

I will make a little more progress.

We have not wasted time since last Thursday. Following the publication of the report, we have acted. Lord Justice Leveson recommended that there should be cost protection in defamation and privacy cases to ensure that ordinary people are not put off using the courts by the fear that they cannot afford it. The Justice Secretary has asked the Civil Justice Council to look at that issue and the Government will implement the changes at the earliest possible opportunity.

Additionally, some of Leveson’s recommendations build on work that has already been done by the Home Office and the Association of Chief Police Officers on behalf of the police. The report recognises that, because of that work, the policing landscape is changing.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

I thank the Secretary of State for her generosity in giving way to Opposition Members. I agree with what she has said about the status quo and about how the media should be monitored and regulated. However, the former editor of the Belfast Telegraph has said in today’s paper that the time when the press can mark their own homework is well gone and that the time when the press can determine what punishment they should face when they have breached the law is well gone. Does she agree?

[Maria Miller]

I agree that we need an independent self-regulatory system that can be overseen and is seen to be effective. I urge the hon. Gentleman to ensure that he has gone through the recommendations in detail. It is not the Government who are saying that the system should be put together by the press, but Lord Leveson himself, and he is right to do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Straw]

The hon. Gentleman and I must be reading two different Acts, because section 44 of that Act contains statutory underpinning. It gives the Dail, the Irish Parliament, more direct power over the Press Council of Ireland than ever is proposed by Lord Justice Leveson for the press board in the United Kingdom.

[Ian Paisley]

In 2007, I was confronted by a journalist whose newspaper is subject to those regulations. I was handed my text messages and told that they were going to be printed. I threatened that Council on that journalist, and those texts never appeared—that Council does have teeth.

[Mr Straw]

It does indeed have teeth. I am afraid that the Secretary of State scored an own goal when she implied that because there had been no references made to the overseeing body it had somehow failed. If she read the Leveson report, she would have seen, on page 1715, that there have been

“between 340-350 complaints per year”

to the Irish press ombudsman, which was set up by this underpinning legislation. However, as people are satisfied with how this independent self-regulation, overseen by statute, works in Ireland, there have been no complaints to the higher body, and neither would there be here.

Extravagant complaints and comments have been made by journalists such as Mr Trevor Kavanagh, who is arguing with a report that does not exist, but quite a number of senior journalists have been altogether more thoughtful. Mr Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail told a seminar preceding the inquiry that

“there’s one area where Parliament can help the press. Some way must be found to compel all newspaper owners to fund and participate in self-regulation.”

Compulsion is the newspapers’ word, not mine, and their system of compulsion is the rolling contract proposal, but Sir Brian Leveson sets out in forensic detail why such a proposal cannot work.

The editors of The Guardian and The Times have both written thoughtful pieces. The editor of The Guardian spoke of the need for an arbitral arm that incentivised the regulated to pursue high standards and penalised anyone who walked away. Mr James Harding, editor of The Times, went further in a lengthy and very considered signed article. He said that the industry must have an “independent, muscular regulator”, and crucially he added that

“the Lord Chief Justice should appoint someone, probably an experienced lawyer, and a panel of two others to oversee this regulator…to prevent backsliding”

and to

“be a guarantor of the regulator’s independence and effectiveness.”

I agree with all of that. The issue for Mr Harding, Mr Rusbridger, Mr Dacre and most other thoughtful editors is how to achieve that end without the underpinning legislation that has been accepted in Ireland. The truth is that they cannot. In legal theory, if the Lord Chief Justice was willing, he could be asked to appoint a couple of retired lord justices of appeal to act as an arbitral body overseeing the regulator, but what would be their terms of reference or the criteria for their appointment? How would they operate? Any sensible Lord Chief Justice would say, “Thank you very much, but I am not getting into that unless I have statutory authority.” That is the fundamental flaw: the idea we can do all that while backing away from doing what was done in Ireland.

I want to make a final point about the internet. The editor of Mail Online, Martin Clarke, was quoted in last Saturday’s Financial Times saying in a rather triumphant tone that the internet had

“destroyed the ability of governments, companies and individuals to control the flow of information to the public”.

This chap, Mr Clarke, is tilting at windmills. It is never our objective or that of anyone else for the state in a free society to control the flow of information to the public. The issue is ensuring that members of the public are not defamed and that their privacy is not unfairly intruded on. It cannot follow that because we cannot do everything we should do nothing.

Seventy years, seven reports. This is where 70 and seven equals nine: the press have had their nine lives. It is time for the Government to recognise that and to agree to implement this magisterial report.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

The mantra “press freedom” has become quite meaningless, as everyone is for press freedom, just as everyone is for mum and apple pie. All Members on all sides of the Leveson argument say they are for press freedom. Indeed, all of us can rightfully say that, because we are, indeed, all for press freedom. It has become a bit like patriotism, however, in that it is the last refuge of the scoundrel. We have to break the argument down and recognise that the wallpaper of press freedom must be examined.

The Secretary of State rightly said in opening the debate that the status quo is no longer an option. She was echoing the words of the Prime Minister, who said in July:

“I accept we can’t say it is the last chance saloon all over again. We’ve done that.”

We must try to give some life to this process. The press have had their last chance. They have had their drinks at the bar. It is now time to get them to face up to their responsibilities in ensuring we have a truly fair press. We must do that for all our sakes, but, most importantly, for their sake.

The Press Complaints Commission is a dismal failure, which is largely why we are debating this subject tonight. The tragic stories we have all heard—the Milly Dowler story and all the abuse stories—are just the tip of the iceberg, as there were years and years of build-up to Leveson. That was largely because the PCC failed to keep its house in order.

We in this House are really just fighting over the embers. Newspapers are becoming ever less important to this nation. My children will never buy a newspaper. They will get their news on handheld devices, and it will be tailored for them—they might want news about arts or music, and they will determine whether they receive political news. The press have in some sense already had their last chance, as they have lost their future audience because newspapers have, to a large degree, become discredited. Parliament and the nation at large should recognise that we have a duty to help to fix that.

Many Members have wrongly asserted that regulation is about we politicians having a say in the content of news journalism. There is a huge difference between regulation of content and regulation of process and behaviour, however. If we regulate the behaviour of journalists and the process they go through to get their stories, that will lead to better content, which will no longer be of the scurrilous nature of the worst examples we have actually had. Lord Leveson said:

“let me say this very clearly. Not a single witness proposed that either Government or politicians…should be involved in the regulation of the press. Neither would I make any such proposal.”

We should recognise that the regulation issue is not about our having a say on content; I do not mind what the press write about and what they decide they are going to write, but it is up to them to ensure that the content of what they write and how they get that content is proper and informed, and is not about trampling over people’s rights. We have had example after example of how the press have ignored that. We therefore need some sort of system in place that allows for proper regulation of behaviour, not regulation of content. That is a vital and important distinction, and I welcome the fact that talks are taking place between the two Front-Bench teams. I hope that they lead to agreement, because this should not be a party political issue. This should be something that this House can agree on entirely.

There are many areas in the Leveson inquiry with which I am disappointed. I believe that Leveson could have done much more on the daily papers outside London. The Northern Ireland newspaper editors were wheeled in, given a couple of hours in front of him and then wheeled out again. Many of us had written to Leveson prior to that, inquiring about suggestions and allegations about hacking in newsrooms in Belfast, but none of that was investigated. I am disappointed about that, because it should have been part of his investigation. I still await a response from Lord Leveson on the matters about which I wrote to him.

However, we have to take seriously the words of the former editor of the Belfast Telegraph. I am not the paper’s greatest fan and I am not its favourite character, but I believe that Ed Curran hit the nail on the head today when he wrote in a feature column:

“The newspaper industry has really no alternative but to…agreeing a totally independent regulatory body in which editors will have minimal or no say at all. Their role will be downgraded to offering advice, if asked for, in the adjudication of complaints but the days of having a direct say in decision-making”—

and in the punishment—

are gone.”

It is too late: the press can no longer be left alone to mark their own homework or to set their own punishment.