When law meets journalism

September 26, 2008

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A law graduate of Edinburgh University who went on to become a freelance financial writer is the latest recruit to Strathclyde University’s new masters’ course in journalism. Francis Shennan is joining as a lecturer in media law and will host a series of coures called ‘Real Law for Journalists.’

The art of pre-publication advice is a dark one but Shennan has the right idea, for as he says: “I don’t teach how to keep stories out of the paper – I teach how to get them in but without ending up in court. I intend to follow a similar approach with the masters. My aim is not just to get them through their exams but also to make them valuable and reliable journalists afterwards.”

For many years, Blade toiled as libel lawyer, both by day and night. He worked for claimants early in his career, and then found himself on the right side of the fence, helping journalists to publish and not be damned. Shennan’s approach is the correct one, but Blade wonders if he has ever mused upon one stark fact of pre-publication advice. When working for a national newspaper the night lawyer, alone, is responsible for the newspaper’s fate – legally speaking. It is he or she who represents the final frontier, beyond which, depending on often split-second decisions (newspapers are not known for luxuriating in academic analysis), lies the possibility of a defamation claim or one for contempt of court, the latter of which can even see an editor imprisoned. The stakes are high, and sometimes, just ever so occasionally, one’s laudable commitment to freedom of expression mutates into a stentorian “No! You can’t publish that.”

Certain stories, at certain times and with a certain lack of time in which to consider the paucity of evidence available, simply present too great a risk. Journalists could usefully be told that there is no panacea which automatically enables a story to see the light a day.

Blade is not sure if any of these themes are explored in Michelle Spring’s novel The Night Lawyer but its title is promising.

 

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From the inside of the maze, ethically outwards

February 9, 2012

Curious times in the media; strange days at The Times.

Would ‘Dacre Cards‘ – the system of licensing journalists proposed by Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre – have prevented the embarrassment now palpable at the Times over the NightJack story?

Times editor James Harding’s evidence to the Leveson Inquiry seemed heartfelt and contrite, albeit that the paper’s former long-serving and much-respected lawyer, Alastair Brett, seems to have been, er, rather dropped in it. Clearly, mistakes were made with regard to NightJack by young reporter Patrick Foster who, once he had hacked into NightJack’s account and thus discovered his identity, then embarked on a quest to expose it via legitimate methods. This, as Inquiry counsel Robert Jay QC put it, was “rather like working from the inside of the maze out”.

But had Foster been licensed via a Dacre Card, would this unsavoury episode in the Times’s history have been avoided?

We suspect not. A raft of laws were in existence at precisely the time when many News of the World journalists seemed to believe that they were entitled to hack any phone they liked. Those laws forbade them from doing so, and yet made no difference. Aside from the obvious objection to them – that they will squeeze out freelancers and citizen journalists – Dacre Cards would simply amount to something to circumvent.

What is really required is an ethical shake-up, from top to bottom. Society generally – not just journalists – needs a sense that some things are just plain wrong.

Supreme Court on Twitter

February 6, 2012

Something remarkable happened today. Yes, the Supreme Court launched its Twitter feed. It even has a Twitter policy, one of caveats, disclaimers and little by way of illumination but regardless: who would have thought that the successor body to the House of Lords would stoop to engage with the world of tweets, hashtags and retweets?

We look forward to the day when court business will be conducted via Twitter. Meantime, check out this link for an excellent blog on the Supreme Court.

Not so right said Fred

February 2, 2012
fred hat

So Farewell, then, Sir Fred Goodwin.

Now you are just Fred.

Not Right Said Fred, but plain Fred.

The Forfeiture Committee did for you.

No one had heard of it before,

But Dave said it had to act, and it did.

Trouble is that no one knows what to think.

Is it ‘Alas, poor Fred‘,

Or ‘Hurray! Sir Fred is dead!’?

We don’t know.

Do you?

By A. Mob, aged 1,378 and a half.