Press regulation deal 'struck'

Written By Unknown on Senin, 18 Maret 2013 | 16.50

18 March 2013 Last updated at 05:16 ET

A deal has been struck between the three main political parties on measures to regulate the press, Labour's Harriet Harman say.

It comes after talks were held overnight between the Lib Dem and Labour leaders and a Cabinet Office minister on a new press watchdog.

But Tory Maria Miller said leaders still needed to discuss details.

An overhaul of press regulation began after it was revealed that journalists had hacked thousands of phones.

The prime minister had opposed establishing a watchdog backed by law, but the other parties have pushed for it.

Lord Justice Leveson's inquiry into press ethics in the wake of the phone-hacking scandal called for a new, independent regulator backed by legislation, which prompted months of political wrangling.

Ms Harman said a planned vote on the issue due to be held in the Commons later would not go ahead.

The BBC's Nick Robinson said Labour and the Liberal Democrats appeared to have accepted a watered-down version of their demands for full legal underpinning of a royal charter establishing a new watchdog.

Ms Miller said: "We're very close to a deal. What has been accepted by all the main parties is that the prime minister's royal charter should go ahead, and more importantly we've stopped Labour's extreme version of the press law."

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If the deal they made holds, there will be endless spin and analysis about who moved and who blinked"

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She added: "It's important that we get the details right, and there needs to be a conversation between the leaders, and I think that will go ahead this morning."

Last week talks ended abruptly, with Prime Minister David Cameron instead publishing his proposals - prompting Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Labour leader Ed Miliband to join forces to unveil rival plans.

Ms Harman told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Monday: "Yes, there is an agreement."

She explained that "a small piece of legislation" in the enterprise and regulatory reform bill will be tabled in the Lords later, stating rules regarding royal charters cannot be tampered with.

This "compromise clause" will not mention any specific charter, Leveson or the press, reports BBC political correspondent Norman Smith.

However, the royal charter for the press will state it can only be altered by a "super majority" of two-thirds in both houses.

It appears to allow Labour and the Lib Dems to claim they have secured legislation and for Mr Cameron to claim that there is no legislation linked to the press.

Labour and the Conservatives have differing views on Monday's deal.

Ms Harman said the deal was about making sure that there was independent regulator "with teeth... so that if the press get something wrong, the regulator can direct them to correct it".

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Analysis

To anyone outside Westminster this must all sound like not so much a dance, but more like an enthusiastic disco on the head of a pin.

It boils down to how to set up a new system for regulating the newspapers that is respected, but not seen to be a law that undermines the freedom of the press.

After months of talks and hours before a crunch Commons vote, a few buckets of midnight oil were burnt to bring the political parties very close to a deal.

David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg will meet this morning to nail it down.

Government sources say officially there isn't a deal yet because complexity and half two in the morning are not comfortable companions and the Prime Minister wasn't at those nocturnal negotiations anyway.

Labour are claiming there will be a Royal Charter underpinned by law. But Conservatives say it is merely a clause that will say the Charter can't be amended.

Or to put it another way, when is statutory underpinning not statutory underpinning? Let that disco begin.

Ms Miller said "this is not a statutory underpinning, it is simply making sure that there's no change. It's a no-change clause."

Nick Robinson said the press had been being informed and consulted during the weekend talks. Key players were the Telegraph's Lord Black, Associated Newspapers' Peter Wright, the editor of the Times John Witherow and the editor of the FT Lionel Barber, he says.

'Greater powers'

Former Conservative MP Louise Mensch said a new regulator not bolstered by the law would still be more powerful than the Press Complaints Commission - the self-regulating body which upholds its own editors' code of practice, and judges complaints about newspapers and magazines against the code.

"For a start off you'd have more independent people sitting on the board, you'd have far greater powers to fine, apologies would be more prominent.

"I can remember when I had a run-in with one newspaper - a News International paper - they said they weren't going to provide the transcript of the interview because it backed up my case. That kind of thing won't be allowed to happen under the new regulator."

The PCC has already agreed to move into a "transitional phase" until a long-term replacement can be established, and the UK newspaper and magazine industry has been working on a new regulatory system.

The industry's proposed independent body would be able to fine those who breached its standards - up to £1m - and award compensation to victims. There would be an investigative arm, to look into serious wrongdoing by papers, and legally enforceable contracts, to bind publishers into the new system and ensure funding.


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