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http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2013/mar/12/leveson-report-national-newspapers?CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2
Three newspapers carried leading articles on Tuesday in which they express support for a new system of press regulation underpinned by statute. They accept that the regulator should be enshrined by royal charter and urge fellow editors to reach a sensible compromise.
The editors – Alan Rusbridger of the Guardian, Lionel Barber of theFinancial Times and Chris Blackhurst of the Independent – also call for greater openness from the newspaper industry.
In a joint letter to the two men orchestrating the industry's attempts to create a new regulator, the former Mail on Sunday editor Peter Wrightand Trinity Mirror director, Paul Vickers, the editors argue that the internal discussions have been a failure.
They wrote: "It is clear to us that closed-door negotiations with the Conservatives have so far failed to generate a politically acceptable outcome and the process has alienated stakeholders in the debate, including party leaders and parliamentarians."
Aware that the three party leaders were set to meet today to discussLord Justice Leveson's report, the trio of editors suggest it is time to abandon what the Guardian's leader calls "multiple meetings between newspapers, ministers and civil servants."
The Financial Times's leader says: "The secrecy surrounding talks between the media and the government has fuelled mistrust… negotiating in public is rarely effective, but the danger now is that theology is obscuring the broader public interest."
Similarly, the Independent editorial refers to talks "conducted behind closed doors" having created "the damaging and wholly erroneous impression that there is something to hide", and adds: "It is time for the media to set out its position more clearly."
In its leading article, the Guardian notes that frustration in parliament at the lack of progress has led to peers engaging in "guerrilla tactics" by adding amendments to unrelated bills.
It is concerned that one of those amendments – to the defamation reform bill, which is widely viewed as crucial to journalists as well as authors and academics – could lead to it being derailed.
All three editorials suggest that statutory underpinning will not inhibit press freedom. It doesn't amount to statutory control of the press, says the Guardian. It need not impinge on press freedom, says the FT.
But all three papers express reservations about other details in a post-Leveson settlement. They are opposed to the levying of exemplary damages on news organisations that do not sign up to the new regulatory system.
They also find unacceptable the idea of a press veto on appointments to the regulator, and the FT does not believe the body should entertain so-called "third-party" or group complaints.
One other problem to be sorted out is the regulator's arbitration arm, not least because regional newspaper industry leaders argue they cannot afford it.
The FT believes these are "secondary" issues and concludes: "What is now needed is a practical gesture of goodwill to break the deadlock and avoid a sweeping press law."
In a briefing to media correspondents last Friday, Lord Hunt, the chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, also expressed a measure of frustration at the lack of progress.
He revealed that he had created a "foundation group" of six people led by Lord Phillips, the former president of the supreme court, and has also called on the services of Sir David Normington, the commissioner for public appointments.
Time in Tunis