Royal Charter on Press Conduct

Lord Lilley Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Tom Watson (West Bromwich East) (Lab)]

I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

For every one of the five years that I have been worrying this bone, people have been telling me to leave it. They have been some very dark years—though latterly rather euphoric, I suppose. Most of the time it has been quite lonely and bleak. We have learnt some pretty dark things about ourselves. By “ourselves,” I do not just mean politicians and the media; I mean the whole of what used to be called the establishment—the quiet cabal that runs the country, all within five miles of where we sit tonight. I am talking about not just politicians, but prosecutors; not just journalists, but judges, industrialists and editors; policemen, commentators and publicists; the bold with the meek; and the guilty and the damned. We were all part of this. This was not a conspiracy that no one knew about—not in the establishment anyway. Among the people I am talking about—the few thousand most powerful people in the land, in whose collective charge are the freedoms of everybody else—in that wealthy, privileged powerful group with so much to lose, everybody knew.

[Mr Peter Lilley (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Watson]

In a minute. They did not all perhaps appreciate the scale of what went on, but everybody knew that a crucial part of our nation’s body politic was rotten. We did not know that they were hacking Milly Dowler’s phone, but we knew that that was the kind of thing they did. We knew that there were virtually no limits to the kind of things they did, and we did nothing. For years, perhaps decades, we collectively looked the other way. To be candid, even now we have let families such as the Dowlers shoulder a heavy load. They should not have been put in a position to mediate on these proposals, but they were and they did so—they had to—under great duress, but with customary dignity. They did so because while the most atrocious things were being done by people charged with upholding the highest standards, we averted our eyes—or we actively conspired. We joined in with what they did to other people because it made it less likely—we thought—that they would do it to us.

At the root of all this was fear: an abject, dark-hours-of-the-morning screaming terror that they would turn the lights of hatred on us, destroy us and humiliate us—with pure lies or half truth, it did not matter which—deliberately and viciously, for no reason other than because they can, it makes money and it is just what they do. The effect was that the lives of the not-rich and the not-powerful—the utterly innocent, so much less able to defend themselves—were laid equally bare to the random acts of malice that we came to believe were inevitable.

That was the dark hour of our parliamentary democracy, whose lessons we must not forget as we congratulate ourselves today. But we can also take heart from having finally fought back. Parliament showed its strength where Governments failed. Brave journalists showed that the profession itself is a proud one. Honest police—more than any in the person of Sue Akers—showed that the long arm of the law, once unshackled, can still reach where it should.

Today’s agreement is a good one; it is more than just a moral victory. It took patience and strength to see it through. It almost feels like a kind of closure—but I do mean almost. We have a responsibility to give something back to journalism with strengthened freedom of information laws, a proper public interest defence and imaginative ways to support investigative journalism through the disruption of digital transition. At this late hour, I hear that the charter extends its remit to internet publishing. I hope that we can make the distinction between self-publishing for pleasure and digital news reporting for profit.

The central characters in this tragedy are Rupert Murdoch and his News Corporation. He still sits at the head of the most powerful media conglomerate the world has ever seen and he still has politicians in his pocket. They still will not change the media ownership rules because they are frightened of him and they curry his favour. Amid it all, the Prime Minister looks over his shoulder as Murdoch’s people start to replace the current generation of leaders with the next. It is most naked on the Conservative Benches, but let us not avert our eyes again and pretend that it is not happening on the Labour and Liberal Democrat Benches, too.

As we reflect on the terrible cost of failures today, let us not leave the lessons half learned. Our children will not thank us for leaving the hydra with one head.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Peter Lilley (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on preventing us from going down the route of full-scale statutory legislation of the media. Undoubtedly, what he has achieved was the best possible measure that could command a majority in the House. I urge the House, however, to remember that when Members on both Front Benches agree, we invariably make our worst blunders because the normal adversarial process of criticising measures is put aside. I hope we will consider what may be wrong with this measure, as well as what may be right.

The Leveson inquiry was set up because of phone hacking and libel, both of which were and are against the law, and neither of which is tackled by this royal charter. Those who always—rightly or wrongly—wanted to legislate to control the press have seized on the abuses of hacking and libel to propose legislation that tackles quite other problems that they see and have always wanted to deal with.

I sympathise with those who have been victims of press abuse—I, my family and relatives have probably been subject to more defamation and intrusion than almost anybody else in this House. Only last month I sent another cheque for 20 grand to a charity in my constituency after the latest offensive defamation. I do not think, however, that we should automatically presume that those who have been victims of abuse have great expertise in legislative matters, or grant those of us who have been victims a licence to legislate without criticism. That is simply mawkish sentimentality and it has led the House to focus exclusively on the legal framework we are establishing—a royal charter versus statutory regulation —and not on the powers we are giving the regulator, or that the regulator will be able to give itself.

I asked the Hacked Off lobby group, which was lobbying me and saying that it was keen to answer my questions, what powers to prevent or require publication the regulator will be given by this royal charter, what sort of material it could prevent or require the publication of, and what limits there are to the sorts of material it could prevent or require publication of.

On first inspection, it appears that the charter can require prominent apologies for abuse of individuals. If that were all it could do, I would be fine with it. In my time, I have had a banner front-page headline apology—I forget which newspaper it was, but the bottom banner headline on the front page was, “We apologise to Peter Lilley”. I hope others get the same when they are similarly abused.

However, that is not all the charter can do—the powers go beyond that to enabling the regulator to do other things, such as requiring those who subscribe to publish a factual correction. That is a pretty dangerous step. We are giving a body the right to decide what is fact and what is true. At best, that is a recipe for multitudinous time-wasting complaints that something is factually incorrect; at worst, it will establish a mini, self-appointed “Ministry of Truth”, which can decide what is true and must be published and what is false and must be withdrawn.

We note that no similar powers are taken with respect to the BBC, which will never be required by an outside body to publish corrections when it is factually incorrect, as it frequently is—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) advises me how to get corrections, but it is difficult enough even to get a reply.

[Chris Bryant]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lilley]

No; I have got the hon. Gentleman’s point.

My third point is on prevention. The charter says:

“The board should not have the power to prevent publication of any material”.

I am not sure what the legal power of “should not” is. The charter also states that the board “should” be able to do other things.

[Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend raises an important point about the wording of the document. The document sets out the criteria for recognising the regulator, not the terms of reference for the regulator itself, which will be a separate matter for the independent regulator. That is why the word “should” is used.

[Mr Lilley]

My hon. Friend reinforces my point. The document does not prevent the regulator from preventing publication; it says merely that publication “should” be prevented by someone else if they get around to it.

In any case, since the regulator can offer advice to editors of subscribing publications on how they should best comply with the code, and punish editors with fines of up to £1 million if they subsequently do not follow such advice, it effectively means that the regulator has the considerable power to prohibit or discourage publication.

The final question I asked Hacked Off was whether there were any limits in the measure as to how far the body and the code can go in future when it is annually reviewed. Each time it will be made more intense and its scope will be extended because that is how regulators work—they always increase their powers. As far as I could work out from Hacked Off’s rather incoherent reply, there are no limits to the powers that the body can grant itself or the extent to which it can go.

It find it worrying that we are, so far with no discussion, setting up a body with open-ended powers. It will have the ability to levy £1 million fines and effectively to deprive people of a livelihood if they break the code it establishes—[Interruption.] As my hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell) says, like the Climate Change Act 2008, which we have subsequently learnt to regret, the charter has the support of those on both Front Benches.

I hope that when the body is established, a lot of media organisations will have the courage to follow The Spectator and stand aside from it and remain free while, hopefully, adopting the highest standards in how they publish and how they treat the public.