Data Protection Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2018-03-05
Topic: Mixed Topics
William David Wiggin (Conservative, Centre-right): I draw Members’ attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I will start with a little anecdote about my local paper and IPSO. On 9 November, just four days after the Paradise papers story broke, the Hereford Times published the headline, "Tory MP dragged into offshore row". It clearly implied a connection between me, a law firm I have never had anything to do with, and tax avoidance, which, equally, I have had nothing to do with. To make matters worse, the editor then chose to publish letters the next week from readers who believed that I was part of the Paradise papers. Amazingly, IPSO ruled that that was not misleading or inaccurate in any way. Even though the article contained factual inaccuracies that I had pointed out, IPSO’s complaints committee simply ignored them. IPSO is a press protector, not a press regulator. MPs can speak out against it in the public domain, but normal people have no such voice, so we need this excellent Bill, which I look forward to supporting, largely because of the amendments from Earl Attlee Let me describe the Hereford Times a little bit. It is owned by Newsquest, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Gannett Company UK, the UK branch of Gannett Company—a US media giant. In 2015, Newsquest reported a loss of £24,349,000. Meanwhile, Gannett reported revenues of £2.89 billion and a net income of over £146 million. On 11 August 2017, Chris Morley from the National Union of Journalists described Newsquest as "exporting tens of millions of pounds profit to its US masters" In October 2016, the NUJ said, after its pay survey, that Newsquest was one of the stingiest employers, despite Gannett paying its top five executives over £15 million between them. I am pleased to say that I do not believe that John Wilson, the rather hopeless editor of the Hereford Times, was one of them Moving on to Leveson 2, Baroness Hollins’ amendment provides for an inquiry with similar terms of reference to part 2 of the Leveson inquiry. I am obviously extremely disappointed that the Government last week chose to abandon Lord Leveson’s recommendations. The inquiry was always one inquiry in two parts, not two inquiries, and it should not stop halfway through. Sir Brian Leveson was absolutely clear in his letter to the Secretary of State that he does not want the inquiry to stop halfway. However, there is no justification for spending millions on part 2 if we are simply to abandon the recommendations of part 1. We must carry out the recommendations of part 1 and then continue with the second half of the inquiry An amendment put forward by Earl Attlee in the other place adds provisions similar to those in section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013. The Secretary of State last week suggested that the current system of press regulation was sufficient and that implementing section 40 would damage the freedom of the press and hurt vulnerable local papers, but he is wrong on all those counts. In response to the idea that the current system of regulation is sufficient, I point out that IPSO cannot be "largely compliant." It is not possible to be largely pregnant—someone is either pregnant or not. As per the Secretary of State’s statement, a regulator either follows all 29 criteria or it does not. IPSO does not, and therefore it is not the method of press regulation that Leveson recommended and that has already been passed into law. The Secretary of State suggests that we do not need further regulation. Why would we regulate energy providers, communications providers and even exam providers, but simply decide to trust newspapers that have criminal convictions? That is plainly barmy.