News of the World: The paper that died of shame?

07 Jul 11 | Uncategorized

Actually, no. The News of the World, now closed after 168 years, didn’t die of shame. It has folded because its owners, News International, are desperate to protect themselves and the rest of their business. Months of efforts to kill off this scandal have failed and the tide of outrage was rising dangerously close to the Murdochs themselves. So they killed off the paper instead.

The News of the World, the historic title, did not cause this scandal. It was people who caused it — and made it worse by attempting to cover it up. Some of those people are at or near the top of the company and they will not be affected by this news. If they had acted properly in 2006, or even in 2009, they might have put things right. Now and not for the first time they are sacrificing their subordinates to save themselves.

This must not slow progress towards setting up a full public inquiry, which has to look, among other things, at the conduct of the likes of Rebekah Brooks and James Murdoch. The truth is still there to be found and exposed, and the lessons are there to be learned — for journalists, the police, politicians and others.

The Murdochs own the title and it is, in law, theirs to close. But in a way they were really custodians of the title. It is much older than them, and has a history. If they had valued that history a little more, they might have put the title before themselves and it would have lived, perhaps in time under an honourable new owner.

Statement from James Murdoch on the closure of the News of the World

News International today announces that this Sunday, 10 July 2011, will be the last issue of the News of the World.

Making the announcement to staff, James Murdoch, Deputy Chief Operating Officer, News Corporation, and Chairman, News International said:

“I have important things to say about the News of the World and the steps we are taking to address the very serious problems that have occurred.

It is only right that you as colleagues at News International are first to hear what I have to say and that you hear it directly from me. So thank you very much for coming here and listening.

You do not need to be told that The News of the World is 168 years old. That it is read by more people than any other English language newspaper. That it has enjoyed support from Britain’s largest advertisers. And that it has a proud history of fighting crime, exposing wrong-doing and regularly setting the news agenda for the nation.

When I tell people why I am proud to be part of News Corporation, I say that our commitment to journalism and a free press is one of the things that sets us apart. Your work is a credit to this.

The good things the News of the World does, however, have been sullied by behaviour that was wrong. Indeed, if recent allegations are true, it was inhuman and has no place in our Company.

The News of the World is in the business of holding others to account. But it failed when it came to itself.

In 2006, the police focused their investigations on two men. Both went to jail. But the News of the World and News International failed to get to the bottom of repeated wrongdoing that occurred without conscience or legitimate purpose.

Wrongdoers turned a good newsroom bad and this was not fully understood or adequately pursued.

As a result, the News of the World and News International wrongly maintained that these issues were confined to one reporter. We now have voluntarily given evidence to the police that I believe will prove that this was untrue and those who acted wrongly will have to face the consequences.

This was not the only fault.

The paper made statements to Parliament without being in the full possession of the facts. This was wrong.

The Company paid out-of-court settlements approved by me. I now know that I did not have a complete picture when I did so. This was wrong and is a matter of serious regret.

Currently, there are two major and ongoing police investigations. We are cooperating fully and actively with both. You know that it was News International who voluntarily brought evidence that led to opening Operation Weeting and Operation Elveden. This full cooperation will continue until the Police’s work is done.

We have also admitted liability in civil cases. Already, we have settled a number of
prominent cases and set up a Compensation Scheme, with cases to be adjudicated by
former High Court judge Sir Charles Gray. Apologising and making amends is the right thing to do.

Inside the Company, we set up a Management and Standards Committee that is working on these issues and that has hired Olswang to examine past failings and recommend systems and practices that over time should become standards for the industry. We have committed to publishing Olswang’s terms of reference and eventual recommendations in a way that is open and transparent.
We have welcomed broad public inquiries into press standards and police practices and will cooperate with them fully.

So, just as I acknowledge we have made mistakes, I hope you and everyone inside and
outside the Company will acknowledge that we are doing our utmost to fix them, atone for them, and make sure they never happen again.

Having consulted senior colleagues, I have decided that we must take further decisive
action with respect to the paper.

This Sunday will be the last issue of the News of the World.

Colin Myler will edit the final edition of the paper.

In addition, I have decided that all of the News of the World’s revenue this weekend will go to good causes.

While we may never be able to make up for distress that has been caused, the right thing to do is for every penny of the circulation revenue we receive this weekend to go to organisations –– many of whom are long-term friends and partners –– that improve life in Britain and are devoted to treating others with dignity.

We will run no commercial advertisements this weekend. Any advertising space in this last edition will be donated to causes and charities that wish to expose their good works to our millions of readers.

These are strong measures. They are made humbly and out of respect. I am convinced they are the right thing to do.

Many of you, if not the vast majority of you, are either new to the Company or have had no connection to the News of the World during the years when egregious behaviour occurred.

I can understand how unfair these decisions may feel. Particularly, for colleagues who will leave the Company. Of course, we will communicate next steps in detail and begin
appropriate consultations.

You may see these changes as a price loyal staff at the News of the World are paying for the transgressions of others. So please hear me when I say that your good work is a credit to journalism. I do not want the legitimacy of what you do to be compromised by acts of others. I want all journalism at News International to be beyond reproach. I insist that this organisation lives up to the standard of behaviour we expect of others. And, finally, I want you all to know that it is critical that the integrity of every journalist who has played fairly is restored.

Thank you for listening.

Brian Cathcart teaches journalism at Kingston University and tweets at @BrianCathcart

Launching a campaign for a public inquiry into hacking

04 Jul 11 | Uncategorized

If anyone still believed that the phone hacking scandal was “just” about celebrities, the allegation that the News of the World hacked Milly Dowler’s voicemails must lay the idea to rest.

No matter how ordinary and vulnerable you were, no matter how tragic your circumstances — in this case it was a missing, murdered Surrey schoolgirl — on this evidence you were a potential target for the Rupert Murdoch’s Sunday tabloid.

And if anyone besides News International and its friends and allies had any doubt that we needed a public inquiry to get to the bottom of this affair, surely this will have convinced them. In this instance alone we not only need to know the facts of what happened — of who did it, who ordered it and who knew about it — but we must also find out why it has taken until now for this to become public.

For the Guardian is saying that the key evidence was in the bin bags of material seized from private investigator Glenn Mulcaire in August 2006. In other words, the police have had this material for five whole years. Either they knew about it and ignored it — which would suggest either stupidity or corruption of a kind that is hard even to contemplate — or they have only just found it. That would be less astonishing, but not much less worrying.

And if the police conduct is a matter for public concern, what of the company, which covered up this scandal for years, telling us that only one reporter was involved and that it had investigated itself thoroughly — and which is even now as grudging as it can be with information and evidence?

But the case for a public inquiry has become urgent for other reasons than these, because in recent weeks there has been every sign that without one the scandal will be killed off by the year’s end. The civil litigants — the victims of hacking who have sued — are settling, one by one. Often they have no choice because the courts would punish them for holding out. And the criminal prosecutions — if they come — may well be much more peremptory affairs than many expected.

Lawyers following these cases warn that every person charged may plead guilty, just as Mulcaire and royal reporter Clive Goodman did back in 2007. That would mean there would be no trials, just short agreed narratives and brief sentencing hearings. Nothing about the wider issues would come out.

So if you have any interest in knowing the truth about the hacking scandal — and the Dowler allegations demonstrate vividly that we all have such an interest, no matter how innocent and ordinary we may be — then your only hope is a public inquiry.

Here I will declare an interest of my own. For the past few weeks I have been working with others, notably the Media Standards Trust, to set up a public campaign, called Hacked Off, to demand an inquiry.

We are not quite ready, I confess — it will be launched on Wednesday and until then the website http://hackinginquiry.org is only a holding page. We will have a manifesto, a petition, dozens of distinguished supporters and soon a programme of public events, but what we will need most of all is your support. Please go to the site on Wednesday or soon afterwards.

The vested interests here are tremendously powerful and winning this inquiry, even after these latest allegations, is not like to be easy.

Brian Cathcart teaches journalism at Kingston University London. He tweets at @BrianCathcart

Code breakers

30 Jun 11 | News and features

Brian CathcartJournalists are being tarnished by the activities of professional privacy invaders. It is time they were renamed and shamed, argues Brian Cathcart
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Hacking, it's not "just" about celebrities

20 Apr 11 | Uncategorized

The reporting of phone hacking victims tends to concentrate on celebrities such as Sienna Miller, Steve Coogan and Paul Gascoigne, which is inevitable in 2011 but which also serves the interests of the News of the World in a way that we should probably be concerned about.

Whether we like it or not, (again, this being 2011) if the public perceives this as a problem affecting the rich and famous they will feel less sympathy and outrage than they would otherwise, and that is surely what Rupert Murdoch’s paper must want as it seeks to buy its way out of trouble.

So it is worth remembering that already most of the victims we know of are not rich and famous by any definition, and that as the numbers continue to rise (it was once a handful, then it was 12, then 24, then 91 and now way beyond that the proportion of famous and/or rich people among them is certain to shrink to the point where it is a modest fraction.

Most of the known or suspected victims are family members, friends and colleagues of the newspaper’s principal targets — the collateral damage, if you like, of the newspaper’s bombing. They will include people such as Sienna Miller’s mother, Lesley Ash’s children, Jude Law’s personal assistant, colleagues of PR man Max Clifford, a legal adviser to Gordon Taylor of the Professional Footballers’ Association.

These are blameless members of the public whose right to privacy no responsible person would dispute, and yet they have grounds to believe that employees of a national newspaper have listened to voicemails they have received or left. And remember, the listening was inevitably indiscriminate — the eavesdroppers heard the personal with the trivial, the businesslike with the intimate. And it may have gone on for a year and a half.

One case in preparation, according to a legal source, involves a woman who was assistant to a famous personality. Because of damaging stories about that personality which appeared in the News of the World, she will allege, she was fired — her employer was convinced that only she could have been responsible. She had a nervous breakdown and struggled to find other work. Now she has grounds to believe the source was her hacked voicemails. She is not rich and not a celebrity.

Besides the collateral damage there is another non-celebrity category: the politicians. It may be fashionable to dislike them (and again, the News of the World is happy if you do), but they too are entitled to privacy. Just as important, though, are the anti-democratic character of what has been done, and the national security implications. The supposedly secure personal communications of democratically elected representatives have been illegally intercepted by an important private corporation with no conceivable public interest justification. Not just one but a least several and perhaps dozens of MPs; not just wacky backbenchers but the Cabinet minister in charge of media affairs and the deputy leader of the LibDems, not to mention, it seems likely, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Deputy Prime Minister too. And these are not, by and large, rich people, nor necessarily that well known.

And there is a third category, still small and possibly never to be fully revealed, represented by a young woman who aroused the interest of the News of the World because she told police she was raped by a professional footballer. On that basis, she has grounds to believe, her private communications were illegally intercepted. She has no connection to fame, therefore, except as a victim of alleged crime. How many people like her are entitled to compensation, an apology and a day in court will be very difficult to establish.

So it is not “just” about celebrities — though it should also be said, first, that celebrities too have rights to privacy and, second, that we are indebted to Miller, Coogan, Chris Tarrant, Andy Gray and others for forcing the scandal into the open over the past year — and forcing News International into its confession.

Brian Cathcart teaches journalism at Kingston University London and Tweets at @BrianCathcart