Press curbs: The
The cracks start to show after just one day as newspapers refuse to sign up
NEWSPAPERS were on collision course with the three party leaders last night as industry backing for their royal charter for new rules governing the 300- year- old free Press crumbled.
Fraser Nelson, editor of the Spectator, the oldest continuously published magazine in the English language, would not recognise the proposed regulator, irrespective of the consequences.
He published a dramatic front page with the single word ‘No’.
Lionel Barber, editor of the Financial Times, a newspaper that had been supportive of the charter, expressed concerns it would lead to ‘vexatious complaints’ and ‘tie us in knots’.
The Newspaper Society warned the plans could place ‘a crippling burden on the UK’s 1,100 local newspapers, inhibiting freedom of speech and the freedom to publish’.
Its president Adrian Jeakings said: ‘A free Press cannot be free if it is dependent on and accountable to a regulatory body recognised by the state.’
The cross-party agreement struck in late night three-party talks was also attacked
‘Worried about the practical cost’
yesterday by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the international body that polices human rights.
And, in a particularly humiliating blow, the Kremlin-funded broadcaster Russia Today described the guidelines as a ‘threat to Press freedom’.
Ian Hislop, editor of Private Eye, which is not part of the existing watchdog system, suggested he had no intention of joining the new regulator: ‘You can’t really say this is a considered and thoughtful process when, in the middle of the night, bits are added to two different bills.’
Rupert Murdoch, whose companies own the Times, the Sunday Times and the Sun, suggested even the Queen would not approve the royal charter. ‘UK royal charter requires Queen’s signature. Unlikely without full all party support. Queen doesn’t do politics,’ he wrote on Twitter.
Mr Barber told the BBC the FT had not yet determined whether to join the regulatory body. But he added: ‘ This has not been a satisfactory process. We will be looking at the practical implications and, above all, what has been completely lost in this process, the cost.
‘I am worried about the practical costs of, for example, allowing free access to arbitration, I am worried about claims-farming, vexatious complaints from readers and others who will tie us up in knots. This is a real problem.’
But Max Mosley, one of the leading campaigners f or new controls insisted yesterday that if newspapers refused to sign up then Parliament should ‘intervene’ – raising the prospect of a full-blown Press law.
The former Formula 1 boss, who became a privacy campaigner after winning a court case against the News of the World for publishing pictures of him at an orgy with prostitutes, told MPs he believed all publishers would eventually submit to the new regulator.
He told MPs on the Commons culture, media and sport select committee newspaper proprietors will put aside ‘emotional’ concerns about statutory regulation and be persuaded by financial incentives.
Newspapers that decline to participate in the regulator, which will have the power to dictate the nature and prominence of corrections and issue £1million fines, are being threatened with ‘exemplary’ damages in libel or privacy cases.
Mr Mosley sparked anger when he went on to suggest that websites based overseas that ignore the instructions of the new regulator could be shut down. Kirsty Hughes, spokesman for Campaign group Index on Censorship, said: ‘Closing down websites is the kind of behaviour expected of totalitarian regimes like Iran and China, not the UK.’
Alan Rusbridger, editor-in-chief of
‘It could tie us up in knots’
Guardian News & Media, said: ‘We welcome the fact there has been cross-party agreement. The regulatory settlement is by and large a fair one, with compromises on all sides.’
But he said he retained ‘grave res- ervations’ about the proposed legislation on exemplary damages. Amid confusion about which websites would be covered by the new system, a spokesman f or the Department for Culture, Media and Sport said: ‘Bloggers are covered by the self-regulatory model if they are the relevant publisher with multiple authors writing in the course of their business.’
The Association of Online Publishers issued a statement to say it had ‘major concerns’, particularly over the threat of punitive awards in the libel courts for those who do not join the regulatory system.
Camilla Wright, who founded the entertainment website Popbitch, said she would move it to America to avoid being subject to a regulator with power over websites that pro-