A CHILLING ASSAULT ON FREE SPEECH
For years, a noble British charity has fought for freedom of expression around the world. Now it’s being undermined by the Press-hating zealots of Hacked Off. Its sin? Daring to oppose State control of the media
FOR more than 40 years, a wonderful British charity called Index on Censorship has been the champion of free expression, opposing tyrants and ideologies that silenced, imprisoned or even killed writers and journalists who did not toe their line.
Founded at the height of the Cold War to support dissidents behind the Iron Curtain, the politically neutral, London-based body has since compiled a long and noble record of campaigning for free expression around the world. Who, aside from the most authoritarian regimes, would oppose its aims? Yet today the organisation’s finances and core beliefs are under threat from a body that supports Government intervention in the regulation of the Press. In which country? Russia? Cuba? Actually, it’s in Britain.
Yesterday, the Mail reported that two distin- guished figures from the world of investigative journalism had resigned as Index patrons.
Ian Hislop, the editor of satirical magazine Private Eye, and the journalist Francis Wheen — a biographer of Karl Marx — stepped down because Index’s new leadership had invited the comedian and Hollywood actor Steve Coogan to join the charity as a patron.
Multi-millionaire Coogan, whose one-time predilection for cocaine and lap-dancers had been exposed by t he r ed- t op Press, is t he ubiquitous spokesman f or the Hacked Off pressure group.
He has led its campaign for a Government-implemented, Royal Charter system of Press regulation, which critics argue would allow politicians ultimately to control a Press that has been free of State intervention for more than 300 years.
Index, unsurprisingly given its remit, had strongly opposed such intervention, which is why there was astonishment in media circles when Coogan’s appointment as a patron was announced last week.
But what i s even more disturbing is that indirect f i nancial pressure had already been exerted on Index, by another body with links to the Hacked Off lobby. For we can reveal that last year, the multi-million-pound Esmée Fairbairn Foundation — which gives money to what it regards as worthy causes — withdrew its financial support when it rejected an application for £40,000 to fund an Index project promoting free expression.
Index was told that its stance on Press regulation in the UK had been discussed at the Foundation’s board meeting when its bid was thrown out. Significantly, at previous meetings, the Index bid had been supported.
the rejection came little more than a year after a one-time SDP activist called Sir David Bell — whose contempt for Britain’s popular Press is well known — and who was the founder of the Media Standards trust which spawned Hacked Off, was appointed to the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation board of trustees.
the Foundation — named after the wife of Ian Fairbairn, a City figure who founded it in 1961 — boasts a portfolio of investments which at the end of last year was worth a staggering £827 million.
Index f i nance manager David Sewell told me: ‘ Esmée Fairbairn had funded us before, but our stance on Press regulation definitely had an impact on our last bid.
‘We got through stage one of the process. Stage two was the final decision by the Esmée Fairbairn board, and that’s when we were turned down.’
He explained: ‘ Our friends at Esmée later told us that the Leveson Inquiry had definitely been discussed, even though it had nothing to do with our bid.
‘Certain members of the board were not happy with our position [on Press regulation].’
He said he had been upset by the decision, and the apparent reasons behind it.
Another senior figure at Index said: ‘We were told confidentially that the Esmée board had deviated from a discussion of a bid to do with arts and free expression, to a major discussion of Press regulation and our position on it. You have to ask whether that is right.’
the source said that Index had come under pressure for its stand on Press regulation. ‘ Some of Index’s traditional supporters are more of the Left,’ said the source, ‘and they asked why we were apparently getting into bed with [the popular or Conservative Press] over this. But it was a matter of principle.’
the Left-leaning journalist and Index chairman David Aaronovitch wrote recently: ‘Index, almost alone among similar organisations, took the position after Leveson that we should campaign against State involvement in the regulation of the Press. this almost certainly cost us donors . . .’
Index has been acting on principle since 1972, when it was founded as a magazine by, among others, the poet Stephen Spender a nd David Astor, then editor of the Observer newspaper.
Index went on to support and publish the works of banned writers across the world. the Czech playwright and future president Vaclav Havel and author Salman Rushdie, after the Satanic Verses fatwah was issued, were both backed by Index.
It is still run from ramshackle offices near London Bridge, but in recent years the charity ‘ overreached’ itself, according to one insider, and has run into financial difficulties which saw it make a number of i mportant staff redundant.
those money difficulties have not been helped by its recent stand on Press freedom, which brought it into direct conflict with the powerful Hacked Of f group and its supporters.
A pivotal founder of Hacked Off, which continues to campaign to end the self-regulation of the Press, was Sir David Bell.
ALIB DEM donor, Sir David was the chairman of the Pearson- owned Financial times and a trustee and sometime chairman of a body called Common Purpose. the latter is a controversial, elite leadership training charity, once described as ‘the Left’s equivalent of the old boys’ network’.
Millions of pounds of public money has been spent on its courses, but it has been accused by critics of being a secretive, quasi-Masonic movement, and was criticised by the Information Commissioner’s Office over disseminating to local authorities the names and contact details of members of the public who had asked Freedom of Information questions about its activities.
In 2005, Sir David and Common Purpose founder Julia Middleton — an author and leadership expert —
established what became the Media Standards Trust, ‘an independent registered charity that fosters high standards in news on behalf of the public’, which was based at the Common Purpose offices. Sir David was the MST’s first chairman.
That year the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation gave the fledgling organisation £70,000. Among the MST trustees was Albert Scardino, husband of Sir David’s boss at Pearson, Marjorie Scardino.
She is now a favourite to become the next Chair of the BBC Trust. The Scardinos were very supportive of the Media Standards Trust. In 2007, it received a $350,000 (£205,000) grant from a U.S.-based t r ust call ed t he MacArthur Foundation, on whose board Mrs Scardino sat.
In 2008, it also received £150,000 f rom the Pearson Foundation charity, and £ 5,000 f rom the Scardinos’ own pockets.
The relationship with the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation was equally cosy. In 2009, it gave the MST £150,000. In January 2011, Sir David Bell joined the Esmée Fairbairn board of t r ustees after ‘a competitive recruitment process’. Meanwhile, Sir David’s media charity had launched a series of attacks on the popular Press. But it remained a relatively minor player until the phone-hacking scandal exploded in July 2011.
It was now that Hacked Off was founded by MST director Martin Moore.
It was run from the MST offices, and the Trust controlled i ts finances. Along with Hugh Grant and Max Mosley, Steve Coogan was and remains its most public face.
When the Leveson Inquiry was announced, Sir David stepped down as MST chairman so that he could take up his highly controversial appointment as one of six ‘independent’ assessors at the hearings, none of whom had experience of mass-selling newspapers.
Leveson published his report in November 2012. By then, the battle lines between Index on Censorship and Hacked Off had been drawn.
In its submission to the Inquiry that January, Index had said: ‘The Press will never be perfect. But we must ask: do we want a Press that is tamed into deference and compliance, or a Press that probes and questions and will, on occasion, get things wrong?
‘Freedom of expression is a bigger prize than a free Press. It is about the public’s right to know.
‘There is already a plethora of laws and codes that could and should be enforced to improve the practices of journalists, editors, managers and directors.
‘To the Inquiry, our message is simple: be careful what you wish for.’
Similarly, Index patron Ian Hislop told the Inquiry: ‘If the State regulates the Press, then the Press no longer regulates the State.’
He added: ‘I believe in a free Press and I don’t think it should be regulated, but it should abide by law.’
The current trial of News International journalists f or alleged phone hacking suggests that the law is being enforced, and with a vengeance.
Even as the Leveson Inquiry moved slowly to its conclusion, in 2012, Esmée Fairbairn gave the Media Standards Trust a further £220,000. Sir David has said he had no part in the decision.
In May of that year, Index’s more modest bid for an arts project linked to freedom of expression was given an initial green light by the Foundation.
But when the Esmée trustees met the following February, i t was rejected.
It’s not as if the Foundation is short of money. Current accounts show that so far in 2014, the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation has donated almost £7 million to more than 60 organisations.
The individual gifts ranged in size from £9,750 to £300,000. Index of Censorship is not among the recipients, of course.
LAST week I sent questions to the nine public figures who were Esmée Fairbairn trustees at the time of the Index rejection. Had they been in attendance at the meeting, and, if so, what position had they taken on the continued funding of Index on Censorship?
Only three replied. Banker and philanthropist Sir Thomas Hughes-Hallett simply said that he ‘couldn’t help’. Poet William Sieghart and a spokeswoman for education entrepreneur Joe Docherty both directed me to speak to Esmée Fairbairn’s ‘media advisers’.
This is a PR company called Champollion. It was f ounded and is still run by Simon Buckby, who was the advertising director for New Labour’s 1997 General Election campaign.
He was also a special adviser to future Hacked Off supporter John Prescott, and campaign director
f or a pressure group campaigning for Britain to join the eurozone.
Along the way, he worked for Sir David Bell’s Financial Times, while Champollion is listed on the Common Purpose website as a company which uses its training courses.
Yesterday, Champollion issued a statement on behalf of the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.
It said: ‘ Esmée Fairbairn Foundation makes approximately 300 grants a year, with a total value of £30-35 million.
‘Our mission is to improve the quality of life for people and communities throughout the UK, and we do this by funding the charitable work of organisations with the ideas and ability to achieve positive change. We do not comment on individual grant applications.’
Questions about Steve Coogan’s appointment as Index patron are also still to be satisfactorily answered.
Why was he given the role when his only apparent activism in the area of freedom of expression has been clarion calls for government intervention?
Had he given money to the financially ailing charity?
The new Index on Censorship chief executive, Jodie Ginsberg, who took up the post only last month, argued that Coogan is a combative public figure with whom they can agree to disagree on this one issue.
Others who have worked at
‘How did it happen that Coogan was given this role’
Index feel it is a ‘big misjudgment’, which is meant to placate the Hacked Off lobby, some of whom had previously donated to the cause.
Index’s accounts show that income fell by almost a quarter between 2011-2013, as the Press regulation debate raged.
The news of the split within Index because of the Coogan appointment has been greeted with dismay by those who had benefited from i ts support i n times of great danger.
Leading Soviet-era dissident and current human rights campaigner Lyudmila Alexeyeva, 86, said: ‘Index on Censorship is a well-known organisation, and a very important one.
‘There were just a few organisations in the Western world which supported us in Soviet times — and we appreciated it a lot. It is such a pity to hear what is going on with it now.’
She added: ‘ Honestly, maybe I have been too idealistic about the situation with freedom of speech in Great Britain. I was always convinced this was something immovable — and now we see that this is not so.
‘How did it happen that he (Coogan) is about to be put in a senior position at Index? It is very sad to hear that others are leaving the organisation because of him.
‘How could it happen that at the top of such an organisation there is a man whose creed is against its main concept?
‘If we do not have any freedom of speech here in Russia, we do want to see it solidly existing somewhere else in the world. And Britain has always been a citadel of media freedom.’