Heated debate on press and privacy
May 21, 2009
A heated debate featuring Nick Davies and Kelvin MacKenzie took place at the Journalism in Crisis conference in a session on privacy and the media heavily criticising the Press Complaints Commission.
Davies and MacKenzie discussed with Jennifer McDermott, Head of Media and Public Law and partner at Whithers and Jonathan Coad from Swan Turton solicitors, the potential impact of recent court judgements on journalism.
The main questions that were raised during the session was whether responsible journalism will become more difficult and whether the current system of self-regulation should be reformed.
Nick Davies, left, speaks at Journalism In Crisis as part of a the Privacy And The Press panel. Listening are panel members Jennifer McDermott, Robin Lustig, and Kelvin MacKenzie
Jennifer McDermott
With the scandal around the MPs’ expenses reaching heights, Jennifer McDermott reminded during this debate how MPs asked a few years ago for the Freedom of Information Act to be amended so that they could hide their expenses. She said that details about someone’s private life should only be published if it is of public concern.
She also mentioned that the privacy law can go too far in protecting private lives, such as in the case of princess Caroline at Montecarlo, but that this was “more an exception than a rule”.
Kelvin MacKenzie
MacKenzie, targeted Justice Eady throughout his speech labelling him as “overprotective of privacy” and “biased against the media”. He argued that privacy law is ludicrous and added: “It isn’t true to say that what you get up to in your sexual life does not have an effect on the outside world.
“As Eady is fighting a one man campaign, I am rather interested in his private life. I’d like to ask him ‘Do you wear French knickers? Thongs?’”
McDermott defended Justice Eady, saying he “weighs up all factors” when issuing an injunction to stop stories being published.
MacKenzie said that the theory against the PCC was “made by conspiracy theorists who only want to get more money”.
Kelvin MacKenzie, right, addresses audience questions during Journalism In Crisis as part of a the Privacy And The Press panel. Listening is Robin Lustig.
Nick Davies
The famous journalist was at his usual passionate best, launching a broadside against the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) and criticizing MacKenzie’s stance along the way.
“The PCC is a structurally corrupt body,” said Davies, emphasising that Fleet Street has been embroiled with phone hacking scandals and tapping into private banking data of everyday citizens without reprimand from the commission.” He said that too many claims are rejected upon technical reasons and that the system was “ludicrous”.
He “profoundly disagreed” with MacKenzie, saying “there is no reason for you or anyone else to be filmed while having sex unless it is a crime, and even then you shouldn’t film it, but try to stop it.”
Nick Davies declared that the reason why the press is getting so much into people’s private life is because of the relentless commercial pressure on journalists to give stories. He added that “technologies enable people to pirate emails and hack into mobile phones, something we could not do a few years ago and that give more opportunities to journalists for getting information illegally.”
“Unfortunately, Davies argued, “newspapers are now competing with the internet where there is no regulation at all.”
Jonathan Coad
Jonathan Coad further exposed the PCC as corrupt, and pointed out its “rank hypocrisy when running its own affairs”, in light of the recent MPs expenses scandal. “Parliament make their own rules, but so do the PCC”.
He presented the results of a research study showing that the PCC code is incredibly weak. “We have had a law of breach of confidence, breach of privacy for well over 100 years. The real issue is where should the line be drawn and who should decide where the lines are drawn?”
Q&A
Questions were opened to the floor, and heated debated on whether stories should be published if they cause “harm” to third parties followed.
Kelvin MacKenzie stated he had never considered the potential for harm when publishing a story, and MacDermott went as far as saying that the PCC should become a part of OfCom, explaining that it would enable the same regulations to be applied to all media.
Davies and McDermott agreed that people should go straight to court instead of contacting the PCC since requests are too often rejected and for very questionable reasons.