FREEDOM OF PRESS

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30073, 6 March 1963, Page 14

FREEDOM OF PRESS

“Citizen’s View Represented”

(N.Z. Press Association) GISBORNE, March 5.

A recent trip to 13 countries had confirmed his belief in the necessity for a free and reliable press where radio and television were Statecontrolled, Mr P. R. Scoble, president of the New Zealand Newspaper Proprietors’ Association, told the Gisborne Rotary Club. In those countries the press was the sole remaining means whereby the views of the citizen could be represented. “Everyone is concerned in the freedom of the press. If freedom is lost to one, it is invariably lost to all,” he said.

Mr Scoble said it was extremely important for newspapers to take great care, because they could influence the views and outlooks of their readers. He said they must be reliable and unbiased . and should report local and world conditions so that the diligent reader might be reasonabaly informed about New Zealand and other countries overseas.

There was little seen in New Zealand of sensational and "angled” newspapers and journals such as there were overseas.

Speaking of newspapers generally in New Zealand, he said some people thought that they lyere a little oldfashioned. “Personally, I hope in the interests of the public an? the readers that they remain old-fashioned. “If we retain these principles, I think we will retain public opinion and goodwill,” he said.