The sense of impunity which came from the lack of a proper press complaints system is a key part of the problem with the media. So too is the sense of invincibility that came with too much newspaper power concentrated in the hands of one man and the lack of proper regulation to guard against media monopoly. And that was also within Leveson’s terms of reference. Continue reading
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In the case of Ageyvey v Russia ([2013] ECHR 346) the First Section of the Court of Human Rights found a number of breaches of Article 8 in a case involving an allegation of child abuse by the parents of an adopted child. In particular, the Court found that there had been a failure adequately to investigate the unauthorised disclosure of confidential information and failure to protect the right to reputation of a parent suspected of child abuse. Continue reading
The draft Royal Charter supported by the victims of press intrusion and approved by parliament provides the complaints system which is long overdue and poses no threat to the freedom of the press. It is ironic that when we’re talking about news reporting, hostile reporting of the Draft Royal Charter has fostered a number of myths. I want to debunk some of those today. Continue reading
The Brown Moses blog, a basic looking site run on Google’s Blogger service, is currently receiving around 140,000 page views a month, up from 40,000 views since the beginning of the year, for its coverage on Syria and the phone hacking scandal. Continue reading
The partner of the French President, Valerie Trierweiler, has won a privacy claim against the authors and the publisher of the book La Frondeuse (“The Rebellious One”). On 5 June 2013, the 17th Civil Chamber of the Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris ordered the authors and publishers to pay the sum of €10,000. The magazine Point de Vue was also ordered to pay €3,000 in damages. Ms Trierweiler’s spokesman said the damages would be donated to charity. Continue reading
A series of policy briefs assessing the impact of Lord Justice Leveson’s recommendations for reform of the press and the government’s plans for a Royal Charter are now available to download on the Foundation for Law, Justice and Society Website. Continue reading
Over the last week, revelations about the NSA’s mass surveillance programme have burst into the public sphere in a storm of reports, op-eds, comments and interviews. But what hasn’t gained quite so much attention is how this programme threatens the press itself. For any journalist who uses the web – and, spoiler, that’s all of them – the scale and depth of spying that is now being revealed endangers one of the most fundamental principles of journalism: the confidentiality of sources. Continue reading
When it was revealed recently that the libel reform campaigner and lauded press freedom champion Simon Singh also donated money to the privacy advocacy group Hacked Off, it was met with incredulity by some sections of the press. The idea that someone could be in favour of a press that was free to criticise the powerful and expose the truth about the important issues of the day, while simultaneously against unwarranted invasions of private lives in the pursuit of prurient gossip, appeared to be some kind of unfathomable cognitive dissonance. Continue reading
On 28 May 2013, coroner Michael Singleton gave his verdict on the death of teacher Lucy Meadows. It was a small inquiry in a small town but it became national news. Why? Because in his closing comments the coroner said that the press should be ashamed of the way they treated the deceased. Continue reading
What do President Jacob Zuma and Oscar Pistorius have in common? In both their cases, the courts commented on the potentially harmful impact on the administration of justice of publicity about the case. Continue reading
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