PRESS COUNCIL REPORT CALLED ANSWER TO CRITICS

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27496, 2 November 1954, Page 13

PRESS COUNCIL REPORT CALLED ANSWER TO CRITICS

LONDON, October 20. .. i T , lu ; of tlle Press Council, now one year old, that it had done good already iu creating a deterrent influence against some of the less desirable practices of newspapers” is recorded in the council’s first annual report. However the report says, newspapers, too, are entitled to protection from immoderate condemnation. om

The report deals with the alleged invasion of private life by newspapers, the reporting of crime, and the treatment of sex. The chairman of the council, Colonel J. J. Astor, says in a foreword that the aim of the council is to safeguard the freedom of the press, and to combat misuse of this freedom.

The report has been welcomed universally by the London newspapers, all of which say that the council has given a complete answer to critics who suggested it could never be anything else but a colourless body without authority. The report recalls that much Illfeeling against the press had been caused by resentment against intrusion into private life. The council gave much thought to this, and sought the co-operation of proprietors and editors in minimising this nuisance and form of persecution. “A free and trusted press is the only ultimate safeguard of democracy. The council therefore holds the view that such disciplinary authority as it wields should be exercised against those practices, which by bringing the press into disrepute, threaten that priceless liberty and weaken the confidence which 'should exist between the citizen and the professional journalist.” *‘Place for ‘Vulgar Press’”

After saying that the readership of newspapers in Britain had grown immensely, the report says that to maintain the circulations on which their existence depended, newspapers had to flavour themselves according to their public’s requirements, and, with millions -of the less cultivated now buying a paper, there was a proper and important place for what, without priggishness, could be termed a vulgar'

press. “These considerations have their questions o* good taste. Counr>S f Vhat £t sug Sested to the Press MM* is difficult and The report says that very few specific cases of alleged invasion of private J“ e + t ad c. on ? e before the council, but on the disclosure of secrets, "some critics, when they refer to alleged press intrusions, cherish the simple belief that they can suppress a piece of business or a document of which the Public ought to be apprised, merely by labelling it ‘private and confidential.

Many a / uss -V little jack-in-office would like to set up his own official secrets act in this way. Every experienced editor will refuse to be fenced off. If hushing up a matter is against the public interest the duty of the press is clear. It must tell the public what is happening.” As an example, the council says it is wrong for members of a town council to treat the public affairs entrusted to them as if they were their own private concern.

Complaints dbout the reporting of crime, says the report, usually took the form of saying that some papers often gave the criminal a kind of glamour and tempted moral weaklings to follow bad examples. “Most of these complaints appear to us to be grossly exaggerated. The press reports both crime and punishment, and we believe it to be good for the nation to realise, by frequent illustration, how’ unlikely it is that crime will pay, and how hard is. the way of the transgressor.” The treatment of sex raised a ques-

tion similar to that of crime. How far should youthful readers be shielded from knowledge of this essential of life, and how far should they be warned its temptations and dangers* editor who knows his business will draw a clear distinction between those reports with a sex element that may excite imitation of wrong conduct and those in which the interest is scientific or at least arises from a healthy curiosity about the mysteries of human existence, the subject of so much classical literature.” Reports of proceedings against home* sexual suspects caused some public protests. In the view’ of the council, such reports, carefully sub-edited in accordance with the law against the indecent mention of physiological details. did a useful public service. “Those who attack the press, or parts of it, often complain of pornography. They put the word to so wild a use that it is doubted whether all who rely on it for controversial emphasis know what it means. The council must agree, however, that there is unwholesome exploitation of sex by certain journals.”

In a chapter surveying the press in 1954. the report says: “At present the mass public appears to favour daily newspapers with an emphasis on pictures. strip cartoons, and short features of human interest, at the expense of political and foreign news and articles involving solid blocks of letterpress. On the other hand, a smalled section of the public is being increasingly drawn to a type of journal where pictures are kept to a minimum and strip cartoons are absent, but where detailed coverage of home, foreign, and imperial news is given full scoped’