PRESS ATTENDANCE

Waikato Independent, Volume XLIV, Issue 6096, 1 September 1947, Page 7

PRESS ATTENDANCE

AT LOCAL BODY MEETINGS IN THE INTERESTS OF RATEPAYERS A leading article in a recent issue of the Bay of Plenty Times puts forward some interesting views on the subject of press attendance at local body meetings. Under the heading, “A Newspaper’s Privilege,” the article says:— It is not often that a member of a public,body is unwise enough to put forward a suggestion which, if agreed to by that body, would be tantamount to withholding from the ratepayers whom it represents, knowledge and information to which they are rightfully entitled. At a special meeting of the Mount Maunganui Borough Council this week, it was suggested by a councillor that the question of admission of the press to council meetings should be considered. Although no formal resolution was passed, it was evident from the discussion that the majority of councillors were of the opinion that the press should not be excluded. Every ratepayer, or adult over 21 with a three months’ residential voting qualification, is entitled to attend borough council meetings or other local body meetings to hear the deliberations and decisions of their elected representatives, should they wish to do so. The reason that very few avail themselves of this privilege is that they feel (or should be able to feel) that they will be kept fully acquainted with all matters affecting their interests by the newspaper to which they subscribe. To exclude the press would be equivalent to shutting the door of the council chambers in the faces of their own ratepayers.

Any local body has power to go into committee to discuss a matter which, in its judgment, it would not be in the best interests of all concerned to disclose at that particular time, but this is a privilege which most councils are wise to use sparingly, to avoid any suggestion that they are withholding something affecting the interests of their ratepayers—whose trustees they virtually are—and which the ratepayers concerned have every right to know, since it is they who must foot the bill.

It is the practice of some local bodies and other organisations to put the onus on the newspaper representative present at the meeting to use his discretion. While such discretion would be willingly exercised by a newspaper, for example, in some private matter concerning an employee of the council, the council in doing this puts the reporter in a difficult position. It assumes, not necessarily rightly, that the paper’s policy in the particular matter concerned will allow its reporter to withhold such information from publication. Such a question can only be decided in the newspaper’s own

office. The chief citizen of Mount Maunganui is reported as suggesting that, in publishing a brief statement handed to its representative after a discussion, in committee, on what was described by councillors, in open meeting, a serious leakage and deterioration in the water reservoir, the Bay of Plenty Times committed a breach of privilege. There is a well-known Aesop fable, which many will remember, which illustrates the futility of trying to please everybody. If the publication of facts concerning a matter for which he, as Mayor, must take full responsibility, displeases Mr Macdonald, his comment provides further proof that in newspaper, as in local body work, it is impossible to please everybody.