Royal Charter on Press Conduct

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I commend the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and their colleagues and congratulate my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition and his deputy, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman)—and, indeed, Lord Charlie Falconer, who has done excellent work with them—on finding what I believe to be not a fudge, but an elegant and sophisticated solution to squaring the circle. I have a registered interest both as a contributor to the press, and, with my family, as a victim of hacking—an issue that has not yet run its course.

What happened to my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) in the courts today indicates just how far we still have to go to get some branches of the press to understand what they have done and what they need to put right for the future. I also commend the victims of press attack who have been so assiduous in carrying through—sometimes with great pain to themselves—the campaign to get to where we are today.

Let me say that the solution that we have reached—and I am very glad that we have reached it—protects the freedom of the press while also protecting the reputation of Britain across the world. It is important that what is done in this House or in our media cannot be misused or abused when it comes to the oppression of a free media in other parts of the world. We still have a problem in this country, however, in respect of what is now described as “the new media”. I hope that the charter and the sophisticated way in which penalties will be applied to those outside it will help us. I was sorry that Lord Justice Leveson’s report did not deal with the future, but we have an opportunity to do so now.

I make this brief speech because I believe that Parliament and politicians of all parties have demonstrated a professionalism, sophistication and maturity that, if applied to other areas of our lives, would be commended by the British people. Let me also make an appeal to some branches of the media and some campaigners who still “don’t get it”, to quote the words originally used when Leveson was being debated.

I want to ask Index on Censorship, which was on the radio at lunchtime, please not to mislead people into believing that this agreement achieves something that it does not or says something that it does not. I want to say to those in the media who have been extremely vocal over the weekend that they should please accept today’s agreement as the best possible outcome to a situation that was at one point seen as virtually impossible to resolve, with no squaring of the circle. The circle has been squared; Parliament has lived up to its historic reputation; the leaderships all political parties have stood up and been counted—and we should be proud of this Parliament and our leaders today.