PRESS STANDARDS
Following the Leveson Inquiry into press and media standards, Britain’s newspaper and magazine publishers have revealed the details of a tough new Press watchdog.
The Independent Press Standards Organisation (Ipso) will have the power to impose fines of up to £1 million for systemic wrongdoing and require editors to publish upfront corrections ‘whether proprietors like it or not’.
The Media and Culture Secretary, Maria Miller, has said she is ‘glad’ that progress is being made following months in which talks on Press regulation have stalled.
The watchdog will have far tougher rules than the previous toothless Press regulator, the Press Complaints Commission (PCC). It is understood that Ipso will incorporate a standards and compliance arm, with strict investigative powers to call editors to account. The majority of members of the new body will be independent and the industry itself will have no veto on appointments, but proper processes for public appointments and scrutiny will be in place.
Report: The Leveson Inquiry highlighted ethical failings in the press
The public will be able to call a hotline number if they want to ask media organisations to leave them alone. And a whistleblowers’ hotline will also be set up for journalists if they are asked to do anything they believe is unethical.
The details were released ahead of a meeting today of the Privy Council at which a Royal Charter to govern the rules surrounding Press regulation will be discussed.
Newspaper publishers appear to hold a common consensus in that the Independent Press Standards Organisation will be a ‘complete break with the past’ and will deliver all the ‘key recommendations’ made by Lord Justice Leveson.
The Culture Secretary said:
… We have been urging the newspaper industry for several months to set up a new self-regulator, and are glad that they seem to now be making progress.
… We all want to see the principles of the Leveson report implemented and the self-regulatory body is a key component of that.
Most in government will welcome that the Press are forging ahead with the establishment of a new regulator. Ipso will go a long way to remedying the deficiencies of the PCC and in fulfilling the recommendations of Lord Justice Leveson.
Though it may take several months for the new body to be operating, the proposals offer a route map out of the deadlock eight months after Leveson reported. That deadlock is mostly attributable to the lobby group Hacked Off which has tried to stitch up a deal for political control of newspapers.
A watchdog with teeth is needed. The public have a right to expect a resolution to this matter sooner rather than later.
PROPOSALS
- Maximum fines of £1 million for systemic wrongdoing by the Press
- Upfront corrections when stories are wrong
- A phone hotline for the public to complain about harassment by the Press
- A whistleblowers’ hotline for journalists who are concerned they are being asked by bosses to do something unethical
- A standards and compliance arm, with investigative powers to call editors to account
- The Press have no veto over appointments to the new regulator
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