THE FRENCH PRESS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23882, 9 August 1939, Page 12

THE FRENCH PRESS

HEAVILY SUBSIDISED NEW CORRUPTION CHARGES EARLIER HISTORY Eighty per cent, of the Paris newspapers are subsidised either from State funds or from private sources, or from both, declared M. Daladier, the French Premier, when giving evidence at the inquiry into the Stavisky scandals five years ago (says a writer in the Sydney Morning Herald). "I do not say," he continued, that 80 per cent, of the newspapers are subsidised from the secret (French) funds, but I am prepared to maintain that a very large number have been subsidised by all the successive Governments. . . "What is even more important is that in the present state of the French press there are, as distinct from foreign countries, very few papers living entirely on sales, subscriptions, and purely commercial advertising. It would be interesting to make a detailed inquiry into the real sources of income of all the French newspapers, for I maintain that, especially in Paris, a very large proportion of papers live on ' business.'" , , M Daladier has now taken personal charge of the allegations of bribery by the agents of foreign Powers preferred against members of the staffs of leading Paris newspapers. Publication of details of the revelations without the consent of the French Government has been prohibited. An indication of the state of the Paris press could, however, be seen In the press decrees announced by the Daladier Government early in May. The May Decrees The new laws (1) prohibited defamation or slander promoting hatred " against any group of persons belonging to any particular race or religion (i.e., against the Jews, a specialty of the ' German-subsidised press) ; U) made it unlawful to receive from foreign countries funds for " anti-national propaganda"; (3) provided that any funds received for publicity campaigns, directly or indirectly, must be reported in eight days. It was by the Government that the new decrees did not " in any respect alter the fundamental notion of liberty," but that they were necessary to "prevent certain campaigns of suspicious origin tending to weaken the morale of the nation." Three frankly Nazi newspapers in Alsace immediately ceased publication Several leading Paris newspapers have been publishing "news favourable to Germany recently, and two leading anti-Semitic newspapers are Je Suis Partout and L'Action Fran- " The abominable venality of the French press " was the phrase used by Raffalovitch, the financial agent of the Tsarist Government, who "pushed Russian loans in France before the Great War, and who knew what he was talking about. The credit of th* Russian Government was low, after the defeat in the Russo-Japanese War and as a result of revolutionary outbursts, until 1917. The concern of the Tsarist Government appears to have been to reassure, and sell Russian Government securities to. the French people. So. the Russian Government joined hands with bankers to " line up " the French press to silence adverse criticism of Russia's true plight. In a single year. 1905, it has been alleged, the official bribes for the suppression of unfavourable news and promotion of untruth, to an amazinff list of daily newspapers and journalists of all degrees, amounted to 3,796,000 francs, then at par. ;, The Abyssinian Crisis ' The then Premier, M. Leon Blum. In 1935, introduced a Bill for the abolition of the secret funds. '.' During the Abyssinian crisis of 1930, the Italian Government is alleged to have bought a few editorial pages in ■Paris newspapers* Germany is reputed to be spending between £6,000,000 and £7,000,000 on propaganda of a most intensive character in all parts of the world. At the time of the Czechoslovakian crisis last year, she is said to have paid enormous sums to the Paris press. Left Wing editors in Paris declare that the Right press lives on funds from Germany and Italy, and Right Wing editors picture the Left press getting gold from Moscow. In France, it is still possible for any citizen who is ready to risk the loss of a few thousand pounds to start at least a "journal of opinion." This accounts for the distinction between the " grande presse," or the great Parj's dailies, and the " petite presse," or the small organs of opinion and financial gossip papers, which have few ordinary readers and are not in the least concerned about a large circulation. Extraordinary revelations about the " petite presse" were made at the .Stavisky inquiry, and one of the greatest scandals was the indiscriminate expenditure from the secret funds of the French Government. It is well known that Governments have been in the habit of supporting financially a certain number of semi-official newspapers and news agencies, such as the Havas Agency. But that obscure and sometimes disreputable papers of the " petite presse " should also have been regularly and heavily subsidised out of the taxpayers' money was regarded as new and outrageous. The Stavisky Revelations One of the picturesque figures of the Stavisky inquiry was Darius, a coloured gentleman, with the appearance of a stage coon complete with bow tie and spats, who was one of the first people to be arrested in connection with the Stavisky affair, and who had been a well-known figure in the Lobbies of the Chamber of Deputies. Darius was the editor of a weekly gossip paper. Bee et Ongles. which, according to the evidence, enjoyed the support of several members of Parliament. The paper came under the part-control of the Stavisky group in 1933, and Darius claimed at the inquiry to have been receiving a Government subsidy of 25,000 to 30,000 francs a month for his paper. Apart from this weekly, Darius also began to publish shortly before his arrest a daily paper called Midi, which had then the distinction of being the most pro-Hitler paper in France. This paper, extraordinarily enough, is alleged to have been subsidised not only from foreign funds, but also by the French Ministry of the Interior. Then there was Dubarry, another leading figure of the Stavisky scandals, who was the owner of Volonte, a weekly gossip paper, which came under Stavisky's control. The Action Francaise considered that it was equivalent to the organ of the Rue de Rjlle, the street of the German Embassy. Ever since the days of Briand, the Volonte had had the reputation of being a pro-German paper. In the Briarid-Stresemann days, this was partly understandable, but after 1933 the personal compliments showered on Hitler were unexplainable. From Several Ministers Dubarry is alleged to have been paid subsidies from secret funds for his Volonte by several French Ministers all at once. It was also alleged that there was a difference between what he got and what he handed over to his paper. The subsidies continued, though on a smaller scale, even after Stavisky had begun to finance the paper. Largely on the strength of the papers Midi and Volonte, it has been suggested that Stavisky had some mysterious contacts with Berlin. There was, of. course, no control over the French secret funds, except that the accounts were submitted at the end of each year to the President of the Republic. That, apparently, was only a formality. The more respectable Paris papers had nothing to do with Stavisky, but much of the evidence before the Stevisky Committee, none the less, showed that the financial background of only too many of them was as shady as in the days o| Raffalovitch, and that

Government funds, both French ant 3 foreign, held an important place in the budget of some of them.