for diverse, democratic and accountable media
When Harry Met Rupert
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be the first to commentPosted by Barry White
On 22 October I went to hear the House of Lords' Communications Committee take evidence on media plurality from Sir Harold Evans, former editor of The Times and Sunday Times. He was followed by representatives from the Media Reform Coalition and the internet campaigning organisation Avaaz.
As the notice of the hearing pointed out: “Sir Harold Evans has a long and distinguished career in journalism. In particular as then editor of the Sunday Times, he was personally involved in approving the undertakings made in relation to The Times and Sunday Times at the time of their sales in 1981…"
The Sunday Times, when Evans became editor in 1967, was owned by the Thomson group, a Canadian company which had acquired the daily title the previous year. The organisation attempted, with Evans' eager support, to introduce the modern working practices he had seen across the Atlantic. The resulting conflict with the unions caused The Times' titles to suspend publication in November 1978.
“A temporary break," Evans recalls in an interview with Robert Chalmers (The Independent, 13 June 2010) “as we all thought." (The papers would be off the newsstands for a year.) “I led a management buyout bid for the Sunday Times, but Thomson's thought Rupert Murdoch had a better chance of dealing with the unions."
As a condition of acquiring both The Times and Sunday Times in early 1981, Murdoch promised that the independence of each would be protected by a board of directors, and made other solemn guarantees.
“On this basis," Evans wrote in 'Good Times, Bad Times', “I accepted Rupert Murdoch's invitation to edit The Times on February 17, 1981. My ambition," he admitted, “got the better of my judgement." Every assurance regarding editorial independence, he added, was blithely disregarded.
On 9 March 1982, the day after he'd come back from burying his father at Bluebell Wood cemetery in Prestatyn, Harold Evans was sacked.
“Ultimately," he says, “Mrs Thatcher was the reason I was fired. Because I was attacking her so much. When she started to dismantle the British economy, the most cogent critic of that policy which led, OK, to... a lot of things... was the Sunday Times. I wrote 70 per cent of that criticism myself. When I became editor of The Times, I continued to criticise monetarism. But I could still see some of the good things about her..."
Coming back to the hearing, he was asked about the differences in media diversity between the USA and Britain. Evans explained that the legal systems in both countries were difference. The US with its First Amendment which guarantees the freedom of the press gave it a great advantage. In Britain there are many legal restrictions with laws around contempt, confidence and defamation.
However, he reminded us that like US society the media there had become more polarised. He believed that since 1981 (when Murdoch bought The Times and Sunday Times) diversity had been greatly diminished and the greater concentration of media ownership brought about by Murdoch's purchase of these titles “which enabled politicians to be blackmailed more easily."
On web news sites he felt that they did not have the financial resources to carry out deep routed investigative journalism which was required, although many of them were excellent sites. In the UK the news agenda was dictated by the national press.
On Leveson he thought that the judge had done a good job on many things, but was weak on media concentration. Given the experiences in 1981 he should have called for greater transparency and no 'back room deals' on future media takeovers.
It was more than just transparency that Meredith Alexander (Avaaz) and Professor Des Freedman and Dr Justin Schlosberg from the Media Reform coalition advocated. Their proposals for media plurality reform, although distinct, included common elements such as a 20% cap on the permissible share of any one commercial entity in designated media markets, such a newspapers, radio and television. Whether or not the committee will recommend caps is still unclear, but their interest in the cases put forward was apparent as the committee overran by nearly half an hour.
Their report is expected in the New Year, perhaps coinciding with the report from the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, whose public consultation on media plurality closed on 22 October. Then the political campaigning will begin!
For a full viewing of the Lords Communication Committee hearing go to: http://www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx?meetingId=14019
DATELINE: 20 June, 2014
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