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| From Snowden to Panama, all hail the power of the press | From Snowden to Panama, all hail the power of the press |
| (5 months later) | |
| Fifa corruption, Snowden and surveillance, Rotherham child abuse, drugged athletes, Stephen Lawrence, WikiLeaks, MPs’ expenses, phone hacking, HSBC, cash for questions, cricket fixing, extraordinary rendition, Olympic bribery, Slater Walker share fixing, DC-10 crashes, thalidomide, corruption at the Met: if power had had its way, none of these stories would have come to light. | Fifa corruption, Snowden and surveillance, Rotherham child abuse, drugged athletes, Stephen Lawrence, WikiLeaks, MPs’ expenses, phone hacking, HSBC, cash for questions, cricket fixing, extraordinary rendition, Olympic bribery, Slater Walker share fixing, DC-10 crashes, thalidomide, corruption at the Met: if power had had its way, none of these stories would have come to light. |
| And now we have the Panama Papers. A cloud of stinking dust rises as another wall in the edifice of unaccountability crashes to the ground. No thanks are due to any government or police force, to any minister or regulator. The instigator is that musketeer of the digital age, the whistleblower. But even the whistleblower depends on the press. | And now we have the Panama Papers. A cloud of stinking dust rises as another wall in the edifice of unaccountability crashes to the ground. No thanks are due to any government or police force, to any minister or regulator. The instigator is that musketeer of the digital age, the whistleblower. But even the whistleblower depends on the press. |
| The celebrated American editor and dean of Columbia journalism school, Osborn Elliott, once gave a commencement address in which he burdened his graduates with their sacred duty. He called them guardians of the first amendment of the American constitution. He exhorted them to go out into the world, heads held high, to do right by America. Their purpose, he said, was nobler than that of any senator or congressman. Elliott showed me his speech and asked what I thought. I nervously replied that no one would conceive of making it in Britain. British journalists were not saints or legislators. They were regarded as vermin. They lived in the gutter. Their job was to shovel dirt on to the doorstep of the establishment. Journalists did not oil the wheels of democracy. They hosed down its sewer. | The celebrated American editor and dean of Columbia journalism school, Osborn Elliott, once gave a commencement address in which he burdened his graduates with their sacred duty. He called them guardians of the first amendment of the American constitution. He exhorted them to go out into the world, heads held high, to do right by America. Their purpose, he said, was nobler than that of any senator or congressman. Elliott showed me his speech and asked what I thought. I nervously replied that no one would conceive of making it in Britain. British journalists were not saints or legislators. They were regarded as vermin. They lived in the gutter. Their job was to shovel dirt on to the doorstep of the establishment. Journalists did not oil the wheels of democracy. They hosed down its sewer. |
| As a member of the Calcutt committee on press standards, I encountered as many cases of squalid and indefensible journalism as anyone could imagine. Though few innocent lives are lost to intrusive journalism, people can be devastated. I am a fan of libel laws, and have no quarrel with a tort of privacy. As the avalanche of trash that passes for “social media” grows, I am sure privacy regulation has a lucrative future. | As a member of the Calcutt committee on press standards, I encountered as many cases of squalid and indefensible journalism as anyone could imagine. Though few innocent lives are lost to intrusive journalism, people can be devastated. I am a fan of libel laws, and have no quarrel with a tort of privacy. As the avalanche of trash that passes for “social media” grows, I am sure privacy regulation has a lucrative future. |
| Where I agree with Elliott is in seeing the wood for the trees. If indeed “everyone in the know knew” that Fifa was corrupt, sportsmen took drugs and contests were fixed, why did it need American attorneys to make arrests, spurred to action by the British press? How else would international sport ever have been reformed? It appears accountable to no one on Earth but Fleet Street. Parliament likewise never reforms itself, waiting until shamed into action by media exposure. The antics of the security services, which have at least outraged America’s congress, pass without a murmur in Britain. The Commons is the poodle of the executive. Time and again it is left to the press to reveal police bribery, NHS malpractice, and child abuse. City malpractice over insider dealing and share fixing was of no concern to the government or the Bank of England until disclosed by the press. London’s financial regulation is a bureaucratic joke. The capital’s central role in global money-laundering and sleaze has long been ignored by politicians of both parties. | Where I agree with Elliott is in seeing the wood for the trees. If indeed “everyone in the know knew” that Fifa was corrupt, sportsmen took drugs and contests were fixed, why did it need American attorneys to make arrests, spurred to action by the British press? How else would international sport ever have been reformed? It appears accountable to no one on Earth but Fleet Street. Parliament likewise never reforms itself, waiting until shamed into action by media exposure. The antics of the security services, which have at least outraged America’s congress, pass without a murmur in Britain. The Commons is the poodle of the executive. Time and again it is left to the press to reveal police bribery, NHS malpractice, and child abuse. City malpractice over insider dealing and share fixing was of no concern to the government or the Bank of England until disclosed by the press. London’s financial regulation is a bureaucratic joke. The capital’s central role in global money-laundering and sleaze has long been ignored by politicians of both parties. |
| No obvious thread runs through the story of media scrutiny. Sometimes it is down to editorial tenacity, as at the Sunday Times over thalidomide, the Times over Rotherham and the Daily Mail over Stephen Lawrence. Sometimes it relies on a solitary reporter, such Andrew Jennings initially on Olympic and Fifa corruption. Investigation is expensive. The Wikileaks and Snowden stories each occupied a dozen journalists for months and cost the Guardian some £2m. The HSBC investigation cost half a million. Recently such costs have been offset by forming cross-border coalitions, where stories are of global significance. The Guardian’s former editor, Alan Rusbridger, points out that “international partnership spreads costs, but it also spreads the risk of censorship”. The Snowden material had eventually to be published from America, where government and courts are less hostile to press freedom than London is. | No obvious thread runs through the story of media scrutiny. Sometimes it is down to editorial tenacity, as at the Sunday Times over thalidomide, the Times over Rotherham and the Daily Mail over Stephen Lawrence. Sometimes it relies on a solitary reporter, such Andrew Jennings initially on Olympic and Fifa corruption. Investigation is expensive. The Wikileaks and Snowden stories each occupied a dozen journalists for months and cost the Guardian some £2m. The HSBC investigation cost half a million. Recently such costs have been offset by forming cross-border coalitions, where stories are of global significance. The Guardian’s former editor, Alan Rusbridger, points out that “international partnership spreads costs, but it also spreads the risk of censorship”. The Snowden material had eventually to be published from America, where government and courts are less hostile to press freedom than London is. |
| Snowden was handled by a group of British, German and American newspapers. The Panama story is jointly run by Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalism, supported by the Guardian and BBC. The operation has involved digesting a massive 2.6 terabytes of data, including 5m emails. Editing and mining this store has been a wonder of digital technology. There was little any government could do to stop it. While the internet has played havoc with newspaper finances, it has also upped the stakes in the battle between secrecy and disclosure. | Snowden was handled by a group of British, German and American newspapers. The Panama story is jointly run by Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalism, supported by the Guardian and BBC. The operation has involved digesting a massive 2.6 terabytes of data, including 5m emails. Editing and mining this store has been a wonder of digital technology. There was little any government could do to stop it. While the internet has played havoc with newspaper finances, it has also upped the stakes in the battle between secrecy and disclosure. |
| Freedom of information, and the facility with which whistleblowers can shift material into the public domain, have dramatically tilted the balance against data secrecy. This in turn has driven government and corporate interests into ever more frantic efforts to stamp on investigation. Whitehall descended on the Guardian over Snowden and smashed its hard drives. | Freedom of information, and the facility with which whistleblowers can shift material into the public domain, have dramatically tilted the balance against data secrecy. This in turn has driven government and corporate interests into ever more frantic efforts to stamp on investigation. Whitehall descended on the Guardian over Snowden and smashed its hard drives. |
| Meanwhile, the British parliament has become a pathetic guardian of the public interest, caring more about tradition and theatre than the independent scrutiny of public affairs. MPs should never have ignored the monument of evasion and corruption that passes for a “British overseas territory”, the Virgin Islands. There are times when it is hard to quarrel with Jefferson’s view: “If forced to choose between government without newspapers and newspapers without government, I should not hesitate to prefer the latter.” | Meanwhile, the British parliament has become a pathetic guardian of the public interest, caring more about tradition and theatre than the independent scrutiny of public affairs. MPs should never have ignored the monument of evasion and corruption that passes for a “British overseas territory”, the Virgin Islands. There are times when it is hard to quarrel with Jefferson’s view: “If forced to choose between government without newspapers and newspapers without government, I should not hesitate to prefer the latter.” |
| Conventional wisdom holds that the golden age of press investigation is coming to an end. Editorial mediation is giving way to “the democracy of the web”. Free online is wrecking the finances of many newspapers. But the economics of a free press have always relied on the ups and downs of the marketplace. Newspapers have never been secure. Free speech is inherently vulnerable to power. The British government is still hamfistedly trying to curb investigation by imposing on it compulsory libel costs – an attempt that must surely now be laid to rest. | Conventional wisdom holds that the golden age of press investigation is coming to an end. Editorial mediation is giving way to “the democracy of the web”. Free online is wrecking the finances of many newspapers. But the economics of a free press have always relied on the ups and downs of the marketplace. Newspapers have never been secure. Free speech is inherently vulnerable to power. The British government is still hamfistedly trying to curb investigation by imposing on it compulsory libel costs – an attempt that must surely now be laid to rest. |
| Few serious papers make money. Most depend on a tacit non-aggression pact between profit, philanthropy and proprietorial lust for glory. This treaty may seem dodgy, but it has held in Britain for the best part of a century. I see no reason why it should collapse. People will always crave trustworthy information on the world around them. They will pay for it – someone will pay for it – somehow or other. The press may die one day, but not yet I think. I worry far more about democracy. | Few serious papers make money. Most depend on a tacit non-aggression pact between profit, philanthropy and proprietorial lust for glory. This treaty may seem dodgy, but it has held in Britain for the best part of a century. I see no reason why it should collapse. People will always crave trustworthy information on the world around them. They will pay for it – someone will pay for it – somehow or other. The press may die one day, but not yet I think. I worry far more about democracy. |
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