Leveson: Watchdog needed to curb press 'havoc'

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Leveson: Watchdog needed to curb press 'havoc'

 

A tougher form of self-regulation backed by legislation should be introduced to uphold press standards, the Leveson report has recommended.

 

Lord Justice Leveson said the press had "wreaked havoc in the lives of innocent people" for many decades. He said the proposals in his report will protect the rights of victims and people bringing complaints.

 

Prime Minister David Cameron said he had "serious concerns and misgivings" over the idea of statutory regulation. Speaking in the Commons he said he broadly welcomed Lord Justice Leveson's principles to change the current system.

 

But he said: "We should be wary of any legislation that has the potential to infringe free speech and the free press. "In this House, which has been a bulwark of democracy for centuries, we should think very, very carefully before crossing this line."

 

But there was disagreement in the Commons about how many of the judge's recommendations should be adopted, with Labour leader Ed Miliband urging the government to accept the report in its entirety. BBC News political correspondent Norman Smith said reaching a cross-party consensus would be formidably difficult because there was little room for negotiation when politicians were disagreeing over points of principle.

 

The prime minister set up the Leveson Inquiry in July 2011 after it emerged journalists working for the Sunday tabloid the News of the World had hacked the mobile phone of murdered Surrey schoolgirl Milly Dowler. The paper was subsequently shut down by its owners News International.

 

Among Lord Justice Leveson's findings:

 

• All of the press served the country "very well for the vast majority of the time"
  
• The press must create a new and tough regulator backed by legislation to ensure it was effective
  
• This cannot be characterised as statutory regulation
  
• Legally-binding arbitration process needed to force newspapers to deal effectively with complaints
  
• Some "troubling evidence" in relation to the actions of some police officers - but no proof of widespread corruption
  
• Over last 30 years all political parties have had too close a relationship with the press which has not been in the public interest
  
• Former Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt was not biased in his handling of News Corp's BSkyB bid but failed to supervise his special adviser properly
  

 

In his 2,000-page report, Appeal Court judge Lord Justice Leveson said the press had failed to properly regulate itself in the past, but he believed the law could be used to "validate" a new body.

 

He said: "There have been too many times when, chasing the story, parts of the press have acted as if its own code, which it wrote, simply did not exist. This has caused real hardship, and on occasion, wreaked havoc with the lives of innocent people whose rights and liberties have been disdained. This is not just the famous but ordinary members of the public, caught up in events (many of them truly tragic) far larger than they could cope with but made much, much worse by press behaviour that, at times, can only be described as outrageous."

 

Lord Justice Leveson said the legislation would enshrine, for the first time, a legal duty on the government to protect the freedom of the press. Putting "a policeman in every newsroom is no sort of answer", said the judge, because legal powers were limited to allow the press to act in the public interest.

 

However, the press is "still the industry marking its own homework", and needs an independent self-regulatory body to promote high standards, he added. Lord Justice Leveson rejected a proposal from the press itself to enforce standards through contracts, saying he could not see how it could be independent.

 

Mark Lewis, solicitor for the family of Milly Dowler, said his clients were reading and considering the report. "They are hopeful that this will lead to some proper independent regulation of the press, by the press but by other people as well, not by the government. To ensure that things, that this, what happened to them, doesn't happen again," he said.

 

David Sherborne, a barrister for the victims of press intrusion, said they welcomed the contents of the report. "In particular the clear recognition of widespread failings in the behaviour, ethics and standards of the press and the devastating consequences for victims," he said.

 

The chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, Lord Hunt, said the press had to seize the baton and make sure it "doesn't let Lord Justice Leveson down". Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg is to make his own statement to MPs, having reportedly failed to agree a united government response with the prime minister on press regulation.

 

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozQVVYry-O8]Lord Leveson's speech in full - YouTube[/ame]

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20543936