“LIVE” BROADCAST OF SMUTS’S SPEECH

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 77, 24 October 1942, Page 5

“LIVE” BROADCAST OF SMUTS’S SPEECH

PRESS LET DOWN BADLY WIDESPREAD DISSATISFACTION CAUSED London, Oct. 22. The 8.8. C. “live” broadcast of General Smuts’s speech before the official release time caused widespread dissatisfaction among overseas news agencies and also British afternoon papers. The Press Association, representing the home news service of the entire British Press, says: “British evening papers on ‘grounds of security,’ were denied permission to refer to the event before the end of the speech which was 59 minutes after the meeting started. It was officially urged that the need for security was so important that the world must not be aware of the proceedings before General Smuts sat down. South African journalists were among those waiting to flash the release overseas. The text had been in every newspaper office for hours, and if it had been released directly General Smuts began, it would have been displayed prominently in five o’clock editions throughout Britain. “Once again, by those ‘mischances.’ accidents or coincidences, of which there have been so many since the outbreak, the 8.8. C. was put in a preferential position, and while evening papers were loyally abstaining for security reasons from publication their self-denial was made negative by a prominent shortwave broadcast. “The decision that a live broadcast was important, was apparently taken during the day and there was plenty of time to inform the censorship and news division of the Ministry of Information who were vitally concerned, but somehow someone forgot. This is typical of the lack of co-ordination between the departments, and to-day the resentment and annoyance of the Press as a whole is swelled by the consternation and indignation of officials of the censorship news divisions who feel their honour is involved and they have been badly let down. They would, if they had been aware of the decision, have taken steps to place the evening papers of Britain and the overseas press on equal terms with the 8.8. C ” PA.