Press Regulation (Communications Committee Report) — House of Lords, 2016-12-20
Topic: Civil Rights
William Fletcher-Vane (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I should declare that for just over 10 years, until earlier this year, I was chairman of the Cumbria Newspapers Group, of which I am still a non-executive director. I am also a member of the advisory board of the Thomson Reuters institute for journalism at Oxford. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Best, on his introductory remarks. He laid out a comprehensive conspectus of the issues of the moment I had not given a great deal of thought to this topic for a relatively long period. When I looked recently at the Communications Committee report, I was struck by how much time had elapsed since it was written and, in turn, how much more time has elapsed since the Leveson inquiry and the terrible events that preceded it. Against that background, the Government are right to ask whether Section 40 should be implemented and, if so, how The world now is a different place from the world then. While the Section 40 provisions are essentially an integral part of the Leveson scheme, if I can call it that—albeit that the detail cannot be ascribed to Sir Brian Leveson—the detail is a kind of ex-post facto bolt-on to his inquiry and there are, as the noble Lord, Lord Best, said, still a number of important outstanding issues. As the noble Lord said—it is also absolutely clear to me—not much of the press will sign up to the various provisions of Section 40 on freedom of press grounds, if I may put it that way. While the case it has made has been somewhat overstated, it is not right to say that there is no truth in it Freedom of the press and responsible journalism are very important, and in Europe at present events in Poland and Hungary underscore that. Indeed, in this country I see signs of some people trying to elbow their way on to the national stage whom, I suspect, do not have much time for it If the national press as a whole will not sign up to the arbitration arrangements proposed, those arrangements will not work. What matters is that we end up in this country, de facto, having a universal responsible process that is independent, unbiased and deals with complaints in a user-friendly, cost-effective way, which, at the end of the day, may include levying appropriate penalties. In this life, there is often more than one way of skinning a dead cat. I have concluded that the system of an approved regulator will not work in its present form and another way of achieving a similar—or at least equivalent—outcome is required. I speak as someone who has been involved in the newspaper industry. The industry needs a system of dealing with complaints. All newspapers have them, after all, for their own internal reasons What is at issue is the independence and integrity, or lack of it, of the arrangements in place, whether actual or perceived. It is not a matter of objecting to what is required; rather it is an objection to how it has been "imposed". We need to be more imaginative and find a system of sticks and carrots that can re-establish public confidence, which has been fractured in the past, and, at the same time, do it in a way that will not impugn the press’s freedom for responsible action in its particular proper activities Let me make a suggestion that is illustrative of the way we should look towards the problem. I suggest the following, which both covers the freedom of the press point and is likely to provide a framework around which public confidence might be restored. I may be wrong because I have been thinking about the detail for only a day or two and finalised my thoughts last night. If I am wrong, it makes the wider point about the need to come to the problem from a different direction Zero rating for VAT on newspapers should be restricted to those whose complaints procedures meet certain basic statutory requirements embedding the general attributes I alluded to earlier. These would be derived from Leveson but would not necessarily be identical to what he argued for. The detail of zero rating in the VAT scheme is essentially, I believe, a UK competence. Therefore, if you comply with the criteria, you get zero rating; if you fail to, you do not get it. It is a commercial decision, not an author or publisher’s decision It might be necessary—indeed, I am sure it would be—to refine the criteria with care, but that is a detail for further discussion. The important point is that there is no question of imposing any restrictions on the press and its freedom to say or do what it likes. Rather, there is a genuine financial incentive, introduced in the public interest, to have a way of dealing with complaints in a proper manner, subject—this is important—to judicial and not administrative oversight. Cases of dispute would ultimately be dealt with by the judiciary and the courts and not by the press itself, or administered by "state approved" apparatchiks, even at arm’s length In totalitarian regimes the judiciary is suborned by the wicked state, as can be seen clearly, for example, from reading Michael Burleigh’s terrifying history of the Third Reich. Ultimately, any country can be overwhelmed by totalitarianism if it is sufficiently supine. Fortunately, we are still a long way from that Finally—this point was made by the noble Lord, Lord Best—it is all very complicated. The arguments that are being run about this topic are far too convoluted and esoteric. Occam’s razor should be wielded and everything should be made much simpler, easier, more understandable and effective.