A journalist of fifty years standing offers a personal and independent assessment of the often troubled relationship between public figures and the British news media.
My aim is to try to monitor events and issues affecting the ethics of journalism and the latest developments in the rapidly-changing world of press, television, radio and the Internet.
Expect too an insight into the black arts of media manipulation. So spin-doctors, Beware!
London, May 1, 2009
A chilling insight into the military mindset -- as explained by Nato’s leading media strategist Jamie Shea -- provided an unexpected but revealing talking point at UNESCO’s annual world press freedom day debate on the international media’s role at times of war. Shea spoke in support of the motion that “governments at war are winning the battle of controlling the international media” – a motion that carried the day by a majority of more than two to one.
Coventry University Conversation
April 23, 2009
There is no doubt that there is a need for expert political advisers at the heart of government. Ministers should be free to draw on specialist advice, they should be able to hear an alternative opinion to that of the civil service. There is also no doubt that in the past there have been highly-politicised media handlers in previous Labour and Conservative governments. The names Joe Haines and Bernard Ingham spring immediately to mind. But equally there is no doubt that it was the incoming Labour government of Tony Blair in 1997 which created the wheeler-dealing, shoot-from-the-hip political spin doctor of today, a party activist paid for by the taxpayer, pulling the strings in Downing Street and Whitehall.April 19, 2009
When a key Downing Street strategist was exposed as having used a No.10 computer to write a grotesque email smearing senior Conservatives it damaged not only the Prime Minister’s standing but also chipped away still further at the public’s faith in the way Britain is governed. Although Damian McBride was stupid enough to get caught, he was simply exercising the unbridled freedom which he and his fellow special advisers have been allowed to establish for themselves at an unacceptable cost to the impartiality of the civil service. Character assassination is now in the dna of Labour Party spin doctors but what made this lurid email so exceptional was that the allegations were entirely unsubstantiated and those targeted included the shadow chancellor’s wife.Page 55 of 57