Abstract
‘It's now down to the press. We've done our bit, we have put in place a royal charter. We've given you, the press, an opportunity to put this issue to bed I would think for 50 to 100 years if you want to. Now, if you choose to set up your self-regulator but say ‘we're not going to seek recognition’, that is your choice. Personally I think that is a mistake because you're missing the opportunity to settle this and you're risking that some future, less liberal, less enlightened government at the time of the next press crisis will hitch you with some hideous statutory regulation which I prevented.’
— David Cameron, prime minister, talking to The Spectator
‘We all know why newspapers report the private lives of celebrities: because the public are fascinated by the sins of the rich and powerful. You can take the view, as Hacked Off does, that such truths must be suppressed unless a ‘public interest’ excuse can be contrived, or you can take my view, which is that if it's true then publish and be damned. But spare us this ‘public interest’ hypocrisy. Why ever did we allow these jokers to panic us into the whole ridiculous Leveson pantomime? And, yes, a firm p on pantomime; and a most emphatic question mark.’
— Matthew Parris, columnist, in The Times
‘Professional journalists cannot expect to have the influence we once did, but, if we're clever, if we're innovative and if we're trustworthy, we can earn it. This is because we live at a time when there is an unprecedented hunger for information and ideas, because the proliferation of new news providers means the number of working journalists is, actually, rising, because the tools available for story telling and story getting are more powerful than ever and because … the new technologies have unexpectedly revealed the enduring value of some old principles in journalism.’
— James Harding, BBC director of news and current affairs, in his W T Stead Lecture