Nicholas Jones, 11 May 2006
There is no doubt that investigative journalism has been hard hit by
cost cutting within the news media. For example, British
newspapers have far fewer reporters assigned to long term
investigations; the BBC and independent television companies have
reduced quite dramatically the number of investigative and documentary
programmes which they commission. All too often there is neither the
editorial staff nor sufficient money to carry out time-consuming
inquiries and investigations.
Despite the reduction in the number of newspaper articles and
programmes on television and radio which are based on original
research, competition within the media industry is so great that there
is still a pretence by some sections of the press and broadcasting that
they are engaged in original, investigative work. Sometimes what we
read, see and hear are stories dressed up as exclusives which in
reality are no more than planted stories where the information has been
deliberately leaked and where, rather misleadingly, the journalists
present the data as though it was the product of their own independent
research.
This sleight of hand reflects the competitive pressures under which
journalists have to work. Increasingly they are judged on their ability
to deliver exclusive stories rather than their judgement or
reliability. One of my concerns is that many public relations advisers
know precisely how to exploit the competitive pressures which
journalists have to struggle with; they understand how journalists do
not always have the time or resources to conduct all the inquiries
which they should make; and how addictive it can become to get
exclusive information handed over on a plate, from government or big
business.
More of that in moment. First let me deal with the practical
problem that has resulted from the massive expansion in the number of
professional advisers in public relations and public affairs. They far
out number the journalists. Indeed many public relations consultants
taunt the media by saying that without their pr departments being on
hand to help, we the journalists would not survive, that we would
not know where or even how to get the information we want because we
have become so dependent on the pr professionals. As we all know there
is some truth in this claim.
So the balance of power has changed: journalists have to make do on
vastly reduced budgets; they do face fierce competition from rival
papers and television channels; and all too often it is the world of
public relations which holds the upper hand. One immediate consequence
of the grip which the pr departments can hold over political parties,
government services or big business is that they can erect such firm
defences around the information they control that it is virtually
impossible for journalists to get through and find out the detailed
information they require.
We have certainly had that experience in the UK under the Labour
government and the spin doctors working for Prime Minister Tony
Blair. What has never ceased to amaze me has been the sense of
discipline which the Labour Party has been able to impose, especially
in Blair’s early years and the lengths to which Labour went to head off
inquiries by journalists working on background stories or investigative
programmes. Labour’s public relations officers have been trained,
whenever in conversation with media staff, to discover the stories
journalists are working on. The excuse is the party wants to help.
But when the pr team is debriefed back at party headquarters, the
inside tip offs which have been collected are pooled and the pr
department works out a strategy to thwart those inquiries which it
believes might be hostile or unhelpful. Staff at headquarters put
out the word to officials and party members that such and such a
newspaper or programme is working on this or that story. The
instruction is: Don’t talk to the journalists; instead inform party
headquarters. Such was the level of discipline, at least
initially that Labour people approached by the media for information
did ring in and inform party headquarters.
Labour’s spin doctors were like control freaks. They would always
carefully think through which stories might or might not be to their
advantage, they would decide which of the inquiries and investigations
they would co-operate with, and who should or should not speak on
behalf of the party. So the first lesson for all journalists is
to respect the confidentiality of our colleagues; never discuss the
stories which are being pursued because out there are people whose
mission it is to gather that inside knowledge and very likely it will
be used to block inquiries and stop genuine investigative
journalism.
The same goes for business: when out to lunch pr advisers are always
gathering useful insights. Now that we are so outnumbered by public
relations and public affairs specialists, we have to rely on surprise
if we are going to succeed with our inquiries. On many stories,
journalists often have no real alternative but to work furtively, yes
even secretly, to thwart those who would like to close down our story
lines even before we have had a chance to investigate them. So
frequently there is no alternative but to wait until the very last
moment before seeking a reaction from a political party, a government
department or big business.
I have been criticised over this myself when I was a BBC political
correspondent. I would purposely leave it until as late as possible
before seeking a comment because I knew from bitter experience how
successful the Labour Party could be in preventing people from speaking
to me. Another trick for the pr professional -- once they have the
inside knowledge about the stories which journalists are working on --
is to begin denigrating that investigation, putting the word around
that the story is false or the reporter is
unreliable.
That happened to me on many occasions. I found out that my story lines
were being ridiculed and rubbished before they had even been broadcast.
So we have to be on our guard. Yes we have to be responsible, fair and
balanced but we have to understand that political parties, especially
for example at election time, will go to extraordinary lengths to block
inquiries and stop investigations, even going over the heads of the
journalists themselves direct to editors and managers claiming that the
inquiries which the journalist is making might be misguided or
misplaced.
This is when the whole business can get nasty: threats will be made;
unless the story is dropped, the newspaper or programme will not get
the interview it wants with a government minister or party leader;
perhaps there might even be a threat to withdraw co-operation
completely. So investigative journalists -- journalists ready to take
risks -- know they are in an exposed position. They cannot always rely
on support from the top, from their editors and producers. If
political public relations advisers can find a way to undermine the
journalist they will.
The accusation made against me to the management of the BBC -- and this
happened more than once but never to my face -- was that my note taking
by shorthand was unreliable, that my quotations, and therefore my
stories could not be trusted. Accusations like that do have an
insidious effect, they can undermine, the editor’s confidence in the
reporter who is being criticised. The only way to withstand such
attacks is to be doubly sure that your story is correct, that all the
quotations have been properly attributed, and to develop contacts that
are independent of the pr machine.
Once the public relations staff know that you do have your own
independent sources of information you are more likely to earn their
grudging respect, so we must encourage young journalists, when they
come face to face with such tactics, to have the confidence to stand
firm.
I would like now to turn to the phenomenon I have been researching for
my latest book: the way in which public relations departments leak
information deliberately and exclusively to certain journalists.
In return for favourable coverage and the right slant on the story,
they are often prepared to allow the journalists to present that
information as though it was obtained independently, that it was the
journalists’ own work and investigation when in fact it was planted
deliberately. Again what we find is a deep understanding by
public relations departments of how the media works; they know how to
exploit the weaknesses and frailties of journalists; how under
pressure, we are tempted to put a helpful angle on the story if we do
get information handed to us exclusively.
For my latest book, I have interviewed public relations advisers who
are blatant about what they are doing. They understand how
desperate journalists are to get exclusive stories; they know how the
competitive forces within the news media can so easily be taken
advantage of. What I found was that there are three broad
categories of leaks: some come from genuine whistleblowers, people who
feel compelled, for example, to draw attention to what they believe is
wrong doing by the state. We have seen many examples of this over the
British government’s support for the American-led attack in Iraq.
There are many opponents of the Iraq war and the criticism of Tony
Blair -- for allegedly taking Britain to war on the basis of a lie --
has produced an upsurge in leaks from within the military and security
services and the foreign affairs department. The second category of
unauthorised disclosures come from what I call serial leakers -- people
on the inside who regularly leak information, perhaps in support of
political cause or objective. They are very calculated
individuals; they know the power of the media; how the
unauthorised disclosure of information can prove so damaging to the
government.
Serial leakers -- because they understand which leaks are likely to
cause the greatest embarrassment -- can be of great advantage to
investigative journalists. They tend to know their subject matter
very well and because they target certain journalists when supplying
information, they can prove invaluable. And nothing causes greater
annoyance to the pr department than the realisation that the
journalists are getting inside information which is accurate.
Two of the most celebrated deep throats in recent years were Mark Felt,
the former American FBI deputy director general who was the deep throat
in Watergate expose and Dr David Kelly, Britain‘s leading authority of
biological weapons, who leaked information to the BBC about
inaccuracies in the British government’s dossier on weapons of mass
destruction in Iraq. What the Watergate story illustrated was the
careful, diligent way in which the two Washington Post reporters, Bob
Woodward and Carl Bernstein, handled their story.
They put together, piece by piece, the information which Felt was
leaking to them and eventually of course their disclosures led to the
downfall of President Nixon. In my opinion Dr David Kelly was by far
the most reliable secret informant the BBC has had in recent
years. The tragedy was that the three BBC reporters who were
getting inside information from Dr Kelly -- it was not just Andrew
Gilligan -- failed to work in the same methodical way as the Washington
Post reporters; indeed they didn’t cooperate at all or even inform each
other. That, I think, was due to a failure of control within the
editorial systems of the BBC
Gilligan went first, and exclusively with the story, suggesting that
the spin doctor Alastair Campbell had sexed up the Iraq dossier and
that Blair had effectively taken Britain to war on the basis of a lie.
If the three correspondents had pooled their information, if they
worked together, if the story had been done in a co-ordinated and
systematic way, who knows, it might have brought down Tony Blair, just
as the Washington Post’s story exposed Nixon. If you look at the
damage which has been done to Blair’s standing over the war in Iraq --
and reflect on the accuracy of what Dr Kelly told the BBC -- that is
not too fanciful.
The lesson of the Kelly affair -- and remember he committed suicide
after his identity had been released by the British government -- was
that a prize contact has to be nurtured and protected, something which
I think the BBC failed to do.
The final category of the leaks are those which are the work of
deliberate leakers. They trade in unauthorised disclosures, they
supply confidential data in a calculated way to selected journalists,
and they hope that in return they can influence the news agenda,
perhaps for political or commercial advantage.
It is the deliberate leaks which increasingly are the work on public
relations departments. They have plugged into the pressurised world in
which journalists have to work; they know how reporters need exclusives
in order to survive, and it is this development which I find most
worrying.
One bright hope on the horizon -- especially in view of the way
editorial standards are threatened in Britain -- is the new generation
of journalists working on news sites on the Internet. I am
impressed by the way many news websites -- I am not talking about
opinionated web logs -- do tend to report news in a straightforward way.
They do differentiate between fact and opinion. When I meet website
journalists, not just in Britain but elsewhere in Europe, I am
impressed by how keen they are to produce accurate reports, to source
their information and give proper attribution for quotations. I think
there in lies the future direction for political pr. Instead of
what we see in Britain, where political propagandists trade information
exclusively with favoured journalists, there should be a recognition by
pr departments that they should seek to exploit the power of the
Internet by providing all journalists with the same information at the
same time.
I think that would be one way to drive up editorial standards. If all
journalists knew they were getting the same information
instantaneously, it would be harder to slant or fabricate stories,
there would be no hiding place because the information can be checked
out so quickly and challenged.
I would go further and say that this should become the guiding
principle for any government or public service -- that information from
the state should be released simultaneously to all journalists, there
should be a level playing.
I think it is unrealistic, at least in Britain, to expect journalists
or the media proprietors to make the first move towards improving
editorial standards, to stop the continual downward slide towards
sensationalism. I think it has to be the state that takes the first
step. Employees of the state should understand that releasing
information selectively for political advantage does undermine the
political process -- as does any attempt to thwart genuine
investigative journalism. And the same goes for the world of commerce.
- This is the text of a
talk given by Nick Jones, the former BBC journalist and media
commentator to the SKUP conference Tonsberg Norway 1 April 2006. SKUP is the Norwegian foundation for investigative journalism. http://www.skup.no/Info_in_English
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