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Mass media: Press Complaints Commission
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Mass media: Press Complaints Commission
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1 Salisbury Square, London EC4Y 8AE (0171-353 1248)
Special helpline for members of the public who fear a breach of the Code of Practice may take place in respect of their own affairs: 0171-353 3732
Website: http://www.pcc.org.uk/
President: Lord Wakeham (1995) - note that in early 2002 Wakeham resigned his
chairmanship 'temporarily', announcing it was the 'honourable' thing to do,
given that he had acted as a director for the bankrupt energy company Enron and
that it would therefore, given the intensity of press attention, for him to
continue as Chair of the PCC until the Enron matter was settled.
Sixteen members: Chairman, Public Members (8 in 1995) & Press Members (7 in 1995)
Chairman not allowed to be involved in press business.
Public Members may not be connected with press business.
Press Members must be experienced at senior editorial level.
Funded by press industry.
A voluntary Press Council existed for some 40 years, which was generally considered a toothless watchdog.
During the 1980s there was mounting concern about press standards, notably as regards the moves downmarket of the 'gutter press', as well as much much concern about invasion of privacy, in particular the relentless hounding of the younger members of the Royal Family, as well as various politicians
The Conservative government therefore appointed Sir David Calcutt to run a Departmental Committee of enquiry. Calcutt Committee reported (1990) that there should be a new, non-statutory Press Complaints Commission. The press were given eighteen months to see if it could work. If it failed, then the Government was urged to introduce legislation. The press were warned by Government that they were 'drinking at the last chance saloon'.
In the event, the PCC was set up with great speed by the press in order to avoid statutory controls. It is a matter of debate whether the press have improved their standards. David Mellor MP, the first Minister for the National Heritage in John Major's post-1992 government was perhaps the first in the new government to find himself exposed across the front pages. Some ministers would probably argue that it is unwarranted invasion of privacy to print stories of a politician's dalliance with an actress. The press argue that it is in the public interest to expose such matters - the 'fourth estate' argument.
Despite the claimed success of the Commission, Lord Wakeham continued to warn as late as April 1995 that privacy legislation was still on the agenda and he urged newspapers to avoid destroying the excellent work of the PCC by 'a crisis of our own making'. (The Guardian 05/04/95)
The question of standards of press behaviour has repeatedly arisen. For example, the issue of digitally edited photographs has become a major issue on at least two occasions. One was when the the then Deputy Leader of the Labour Party in opposition, John Prescott (now Deputy Prime Minister (1997)), was shown in a photograph together with his wife sitting at a pub table on which was what appeared to be a bottle of champagne. The photograph was published in the Conservative-supporting London Evening Standard above an article which questioned whether Prescott was now a 'champagne socialist' disloyal to his working class roots. This was in the very early days of the build-up towards the election campaign when the Conservative press attempted the difficult balancing act of claiming that the Labour leadership was anti-business and pro-union at the same time as also claiming that they were hypocritical in belonging to the Labour Party when they had all become middle class. It eventually transpired that in the original photograph there was in fact a bottle of beer on the table immediately in front of Prescott. It had been digitally removed from the picture.
Another high profile case arose in early 1997 when Murdoch's Sun published photos of Princess Diana and her lover Captain James Hewitt cavorting in a bedroom. The photos were shot, clearly with a very long range lens, through the windows of what appeared to be a country house. Unfortunately for the Sun, it transpired that the photos were a hoax, but the incident did nevertheless raise questions about press standards if they were prepared to publish pictures of a very intimate nature. How could they claim that this was information in the public interest? What could the Sun claim that the public had a right to know here? After all, Charles' and Diana's adultery during the marriage was in the public domain, admitted by each of them. What purpose could be served by publishing pictures of it? Except of course boosting circulation figures.
In the summer of 1997, the Daily Mirror, arch-rival to the Sun reputedly paid a quarter of a million dollars for photographs of Princess Diana and her alleged lover at the time, Dodi Al-Fayed, kissing in a boat on the Mediterranean. Here again it emerged that one crucial photograph was digitally altered by the Mirrorto make it look as if the Princess and Al-Fayed were kissing.
Finally, in August 1997, there was a wave of public revulsion against the 'paperazzi', the freelance photographers, who were widely believed to have caused the death of Diana and Al-Fayed as photographers on motorcycles chased their chauffeur-driven car through the streets of Paris, allegedly causing a fatal car crash. At the time of writing, it the cause of the crash has yet to be determined. On the day she died, her brother made a full frontal attack on the press, accusing every editor who had ever paid for sensational photos of her of having 'blood on his hands'. This sentiment seemed to be echoed by many of those who flocked to Buckingham and Kensington Palaces to mourn her. The Great British Public would do well to remember, though, that Princess Diana, self-styled 'Princess of Hearts', was good box-office. Whenever she was featured in newspapers, circulation rocketed. If newspaper editors can reasonably be said to be complicit in her death, then so must the newspapers' readers. One might also argue that one who deliberately courted media attention can hardly be said to have been 'hounded'. It is ironic, perhaps, that the Princess died in France, perhaps the country with the most draconian privacy laws in the whole of Europe.
The issue of invasion of royals' privacy was high on the agenda again in May 1999, when The Sun editor, David Yelland, decided to publish pictures of the bride-to-be of Prince Edward in which one of her nipples was visible. Rival newspapers were quick to exploit the publication as a crass error of judgment, as indeed was the Palace. Interestingly, The Times, like The Sun one of the Murdoch stable, also criticized Yelland's 'empty folly' in publishing the picture. An Observer/ICM poll taken at the time revealed that 77% of those questioned felt Britain should have some kind of privacy laws to prevent press intrusion. It continued to seem unlikely, though, that either the Home Secretary, Jack Straw, or the Lord Chancellor, Lord Irvine, would relish any attempt to frame a workable law.
Yelland, like every other newspaper editor, has the observance of the PCC's code written into his contract and can therefore be sacked if in flagrant breach. Murdoch 'stood by' his editor, but the media outcry over the pictures may well prove to have been a significant warning to the tabloids. This seems to be borne out by the opprobrium heaped on The Sport later in the year by other newspaper editors when Tony Livesey, editor-in-Chief, decided to run photos of Prime Minister Tony Blair's son Euan kissing a girl at the Ministry of Sound club. Several downmarket tabloids had also been offered the photos, but declined to publish because they clearly infringed against the code. After Tony Balir made a formal complaint to the PCC, other editors were quick to express their anger with Livesey and to distance themselves from The Sport's practice, no doubt in an attempt to defuse the row before it might lead to any strengthening of the Code.
In The Guardian of April 12 1999, Lord Wakeham, the PCC's head, mounted a stout defence of the current self-policing system, arguing that the code imposes a significant degree of self-censorship on editors and that the 'genuinely independent' commission guarantees that the system will be operated fairly. In defence of the PCC, Wakeham pointed out that since 1991 the Commission had dealt with 25,000 complaints and that in all of those the editors had responded in terms of the code. Further, such problems as jigsaw identification of children in child abuse cases, identification of victims of sexual assault have now been almost completely stamped out, as also intrusion into the privacy of hospital patients and the unauthorized use of listening devices. Wakeham claimed also that he could not think of a single editor who would not correct an acknowleged inaccuracy rather than suffer the Commission's censure. Finally, in Wakeham's view, one significant virtue of the voluntary system is that it ensures cases are settled swiftly, 75% of all complaints being dealt with in forty working days, which, he says, would almost certainly not be the case if there were a statutory system, which would be challenged all along the line by editors.
On the whole, ten years (in 2001) after its founding, the PCC seems to have been a success, though many commentators remain dissatisfied with the PCC's preference for acting as conciliator rather than judge, with the result that newspapers often have to publish a small correction or letter, which seems to many of the aggrieved to be a small price to pay for what they have suffered. Another significant criticism of the PCC is that it does not permit complaints by third parties or by groups. Thus, for example, there is no way that asylum seekers can respond to their vilification in the British press, unless one of them is named individually.
So under New Labour the issue of invasion of privacy remained high on the agenda. Commenting on press reports on Foreign Secretary Robin Cook's affair with his secretary, Labour's Lord Chancellor, Lord Irvine, suggested in the early days of the New Labour Administration that there should be formalized protection of privacy with the PCC given effective powers and remedies. All campaigners for freedom of speech have always argued strongly against such 'prior restraint' and Irvine was duly given a well-deserved kicking by the British press and the usually restrained Lord Wakeham, Chairman of the PCC, expressed his disquiet about the Lord Chancellor's Human Rights Bill, which has now become the Human Rights Act, incorporating the European Convention on Human Rights into British law.
Downing Street was quick to dissociate itself from Irvine's statement, assuring the press that there was no intention of introducing legislation on privacy. However, Article 8 of the European Convention may well come to be interpreted by the judges as in effect affording protection of privacy - thus 'prior restraint' on the freedom of the press - although Article 10 guarantees the freedom of the press.
Furthermore, Downing Street's statement seems disingenuous at best, given that the new government's Data Protection Bill had already had its second reading in Parliament. The Bill is intended to implement the European Directive on the Protection of Individuals in regard to the Processing of Data and thus will bring Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights into British law, protecting 'the fundamental rights and freedoms, notably the right to privacy'. This Bill caused grave concern in the press, since its definition of 'personal data' was so broad that it could, for example, encompass Robin Cook's relationship with his secretary (now his wife) and the Bill would cover all such data held on computer, which of course would cover journalists' stories. The Bill would require disclosure by a newspaper in reply to any enquiry by an individual as to whether data are held about her and intends to give such an individual the right to require the newspaper not to use the personal data if their use may cause 'substantial damage' or 'substantial distress'. There are other clauses in the Bill which provide for exemptions of journalists, but their application will ultimately depend on the courts' interpretation of them.
After the Human Rights Act entered into law, it seemed ironic that the first legal case in Britain to appeal to the right to privacy enshrined in the European convention was brought by a couple who actively courted publicity - Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones. They had signed an exclusive contract with OK! magazine giving the magazine the right to photograph their wedding. All other cameras were excluded, guests electronically frisked as they arrived. Somebody, however, clearly did smuggle a camera in, since Hello! magazine, OK!'s arch-rival proposed to publish photos three days before OK! OK! attempted, and failed, to prevent the publication of the photos, but Douglas and Zeta-Jones intended to sue Hello! for breach of privacy. Now that might seem a pretty odd claim, given that they appeared to have sold their right to privacy to OK! However, the appeal court agreed with them that, since they had insisted on having full editorial control over the choice of photos, they had in fact retained the right to privacy since they would have been able to maintain control of the way in which their image was presented. The appeal court ruled that they had a reasonable chance of winning and allowed their suit to proceed.
In June 2001, Heather Mills, at the time Paul McCartney's girlfriend, failed in a bid to prevent the Sun from revealing the address of a house she had bought in Hove, even though e-mails she had received had led her to believe that she was in danger. In that case the judge took into account that it was well-known that Miss Mills already lived in Hove and that her new address was bound to become known simply because she was well-known and lived in a busy town.
Around the same time, it was ruled by the High Court that no British media outlet would ever be permitted to reveal the whereabouts of Thompson and Venables, the child killers of toddler James Bulger, who, having reached the age of 18, were due for release at that time.
In July 2001 TV celebrity Amanda Holden sought an ex parte injunction against the Daily Star newspaper (an ex parte injunction is issued in the absence of one of the parties - the Daily Star in this case). She had been photographed apparently using a long lens while on holiday with her husband in a private Italian villa. Although the PCC would almost certainly have censured the use of the pictures, Ms Holden chose to go straight to court, claiming infringement of her right to privacy under the Human Rights Act. Ms Holden demanded that the Star desist from publishing the other photos it intended to publish and issued a writ demanding damages.
The law relating to privacy seems currently to be a mess. There never has been any such right recognized in British common law, but the right is recognized under the European Convention. If such actions as Douglas's and Holden's are successful, especially since damages might turn out to be much higher than any fines which could be imposed by a regulatory body, then the PCC's self-regulatory code will take on a mandatory character, in effect introducing 'prior restraint', especially if a damages element is introduced. Whilst many of us might find the intrusiveness of the tabloid press unwarranted and distasteful much of the time, the effects of prior restraint could be disastrous for investigative journalism. Was the lying politician, Johnathan Aitken, on a private holiday when he was in Paris? If he was and the Human Rights Act had been law at the time, how could The Guardian legally have discovered who paid his hotel bill?
How this right comes to be applied and how it will impact on the media rests in the lap of the judiciary for now. There have been complaints in the first few months since the Act became law from a variety of different celebrities. There is a distinct possibility that the press, which has escaped legislation on privacy through its relatively responsible attitude in recent years, may well have privacy legislation imposed on it, as a result of the Human Rights Act. Since the European Convention also enshrines the right to freedom of speech, it is difficult to see how these two potentially self-contradictory rights can both be safeguarded.
The PCC operate a Code of Practice which covers the following:
The PCC will normally consider complaints from those people directly affected. It may sometimes consider complaints from third parties.
The PCC will not consider complaints which are the subject of court proceedings, nor complaints which the complainant intends to take to court.
Complaints are normally accepted only within one month of the publication of the subject of the complaint.
Normally, the PCC will expect that the matter will have been taken up with the appropriate editor before the PCC is approached.
Complaints may normally be made only about matters covered by the Code of Practice.
Complaints are normally dealt with on paper, with no formal hearings.
Complaints are first sent to the relevant editor in the hope that the complaint can be resolved.
If it is not resolved, the PCC will invite comment from the editor and sometimes from a third party.
A report is then considered at the PCC's monthly meeting.
The PCC's adjudication is then sent to all parties. The newspaper or magazine is required to publish the adjudication when a complaint is upheld. Publication is not required in cases of intrusion into privacy or something which may allow the identification of children.
Regulation and censorship contents list
Introduction to Mass Media Effects
Glossary of media studies terms
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