The report on the Press

At the Annual Delegate Meeting of the National Union of Journalists, held in 1944, a report by a sub-committee dealing with the post-war policy of the Union, was referred back by the delegates on the grounds that it did not deal with ” the basic question of the trend towards monopoly in the industry.” From this molehill developed a mountain—the Royal Commission on the Press. The question of whether its labour brought forth a mouse—as the Conservatives would prefer to think, or a much larger animal—as the Labourites say, we must leave until later in the article.

To get back to the National Union of Journalists. Its first report having been referred back, the committee concerned made a second attempt and submitted a further report the following year; its conclusion this time was that the information required could only be obtained by means of an independent enquiry. This was accepted by the Union and a further committee was set up to investigate the slightly different question of the effects of monopolies upon the development of the Press.

So far, all these events had taken place within the Union itself, but at the 1946 Delegate Meeting a resolution was passed (with only one vote against) recommending that the Government should take the step of appointing a Royal Commission. In line with this, two Labour M.P.s (both journalists and members of the Union) raised the matter in Parliament and a resolution giving the necessary authority for the appointment of a Commission was carried by a large majority. The resolution was carried on a free vote, the Labour Party generally voting in favour and the Conservatives against. Seven Labour M.P.s also opposed the motion; and though most Ministers voted in favour, Attlee, Alexander, Cripps, Wilmot, Barnes, Griffiths and Silkin abstained. This was in October, 1946. The Commission held its first meeting in April, 1947, proceeded to take a vast mass of evidence from all kinds of organisations and individuals connected with the Press, and published its findings in June of this year.

The above summarises briefly the main events leading up to the issue of the Report.

Its Reception by the Press
The reception that the Press gave to the Report makes interesting and amusing reading. The Conservatives had generally been hostile to the idea of a Press Commission and this hostility had been reflected all along in most of their newspapers. When the Report (in their own opinion, of course) turned out to be not as bad as they had feared, their Press was openly jubilant, a typical headline being the Daily Graphic’s “British Press is Vindicated.” On the other hand, the Daily Herald, which had enthusiastically echoed the Labour Party’s demand for an enquiry, found the Report very little to its taste, and its lack of enthusiasm was most marked. The best it could do was a five-inch single-column write-up under the timid headline “Press Council Urged.” True, the reference managed to get itself placed on the front page, but it was not among the top headlines; rather did it show all the signs of having been tucked quietly out of the way. Most significant feature of all, there was a complete absence of editorial comment.

With a few exceptions, the line taken by the Press on the Report served, ironically enough, to heavily underline one of the Commissions own findings—that “Their treatment of public affairs is …. frankly partisan” (p. 150). On this question the Observer, which had itself come under heavy fire from the Commission for a breach of accuracy, said (3/7/49): —

“That newspapers are capable of inaccurate reporting was nicely demonstrated last Thursday, when almost every popular newspaper summarised the findings of the Royal Commission on the Press in a manner favourable to themselves. No one who relied on these papers for his information could have guessed that much of the Commission’s Report was unfavourable to our industry or profession. The Commission proves, with example after example, that personal and political bias often dictate the way in which an event is reported.”

But the most damning comment of all came from one of the members of the Commission itself, Sir George Waters, who spoke to the Institute of Journalists on the 12th July, and was quoted in the House of Commons by Mr. Oliver Stanley, M.P., as follows: —

“I have been seriously disturbed by the selective treatment which the Commission’s Report has received from the editorials of newspapers. I can assure you that the Commission never intended this to be a white-washing report; nor is it. It has been hailed as a complete vindication of the Press, or, in any case, as a vindication. It is nothing of the kind. Those who say so cannot have read the Report or cannot have understood it. It is, in fact, severely critical of the performance of the Press; it is a vindication of the organisation, not the performance of the Press. I still feel that there is more in the Report than is good for the health of our profession or any profession. Some of my colleagues thought the Press very inefficient in the medium of self-criticism . . . Yet the case against the general council, as stated in one newspaper after another, rests on the assertion that the Commission found little or nothing wrong with the Press. This unwillingness to face the facts, this wanton neglect of the plain conclusions of the Report, shows the Press, I am sorry to say, in a very poor light.” (“Hansard,” Col. 2703. 28.7.49.)

The Report of the Commission
Of what value is the Report to Socialists? Primarily as a useful and comprehensive source of information about the Press—about its ownership, its organisation, its control, and its standards of reporting. The wrangles of the Labour Party and the Conservatives over monopolies and concentrations of ownership quite frankly leave us cold. The attitude of the Tories is naturally that there is little wrong with things as they are, and they obviously would not weep great salt tears if ownership became more concentrated. This was expected and nobody should be surprised. But what of the Labour Party? All kinds of motives have been read into their hue and cry for a Press Commission, but with them we are not concerned. We judge the Labour Party, not by their motives, but by their actions, and their actions over this question demonstrate quite clearly to us that they are once more pre-occupied with chasing the shadow instead of laying hold of the substance. They are chasing the will-of-the-wisp of news¬ paper monopoly whilst leaving the marsh of Capitalism undrained, just as a few months ago they tried to lay hold of six other will-of-the-wisps by appointing a Monopoly Commission. They are once again trying to reform Capitalism whilst leaving its basis untouched.

Our position on this issue is quite clear, as it is on other attempts to reform Capitalism. Our concern is not to reform it, but to abolish it. To do this we need the conscious understanding of the majority of the working class, which in turn requires political democracy and the ability to speak and write freely, together with access to information which, even if it is not accurate, can be checked in the light of other information and its inaccuracy confirmed. That democracy, making all allowances for shortcomings in certain directions, exists in this country now, and we are able to propagate our ideas as a result. But it is important to remember why it exists and upon what factors it depends. It is not made by Press Barons, nor is it dependent upon them. It is dependent upon two things—first that British Capitalism finds it more efficient and useful to have democracy, and, secondly and most important, the working class have fought for it and desire to retain it.

The task of getting Socialist knowledge across to the working class is a difficult and arduous one. That is one reason why the enthusiasms of Labourites for this Press Commission make us smile. What is their case? First, that there is a danger of monopoly in the industry. Newspapers, they argue (and with some truth), are being concentrated into fewer hands, into “chains.” Let us take this argument, as it affects the S.P.G.B. Imagine the most extreme situation, where all the Conservative Press is concentrated in the Daily Express, the Liberal Press in the News Chronicle, the Labour Press in the Daily Herald, and the Communist Press in the Daily Worker. What would be changed as far as we are concerned? Only this—that anti-Socialist propaganda would be put out by four newspapers instead of a dozen or more. Our job would still be to push our own Press, the SOCIALIST STANDARD. Our task of trying to get workers to understand Socialism would still be unchanged.

As for inaccuracy, misreporting, deliberate distortion, these make us smile still more. The S.P.G.B. has suffered from the distortions and omissions of the Press for years, and we have received no better treatment from the Daily Herald than we have from the others. On these matters it is tarred with the same brush as the others, as the Commission’s report amply proves. But the whole game is given away as far as we are concerned when we find that one of the most severe rebukes administered by the Commission was given to the National Union of Journalists and certain journalist M.P.s. Dealing with the evidence they submitted, it said: —

“We called before us several of the journalists who spoke in favour of the motion demanding the appointment of the Commission, but neither they nor the National Union of Journalists produced much positive evidence in support of their criticism, and some of what was produced did not stand up to examination. The Memorandum submitted to us by the Union was not a survey of the Press as a whole, but rather an attack on the right wing portion of it. In the light of what follows in this chapter, the fact that the Daily Worker and the Daily Mirror were the only national daily papers not characterised by name, while the Daily Herald was scarcely mentioned, is some indication of the selective nature of the document. The Memorandum gave us no coherent and comprehensive picture and no means of reaching general conclusions about the extent and character of the abuses which had been said to exist.” (Page 107.)

The Daily Herald, the Daily Worker, and the Daily Mirror! What a noble trio of examples to the Press! And what a fine comment upon these crusaders after truth, accuracy, and impartial reporting.
S. H.