Nothing quite like meeting up with old British media friends to be reminded what a good move it was to liberate one-self from full-time journalism when one still has the energy and spirit to do something altogether more worthwhile and positive-like choosing what to write, when and for whom.
While my former colleagues immersed themselves in gossip- an as yet unpublished scandal, rumours of imminent redundancies, the slick performances of certain editors on Question Time, and the struggle of older journalists to feel appreciated- I could think only what a bloody awful week it had been for British journalism generally.
The site of editors across the political spectrum having a cosy breakfast together , and indulging in a similarly consensual love-in with David Cameron- the 2012 , national newspapers’ equivalent of the old beer and sandwiches fraternising that went on between the TUC and Number 10 in the old Labour days’- made me feel distinctly uncomfortable.
Months of public exposure of the most self-indulgent, self-important, and in some cases corrupt representatives of the trade , and a key recommendation for fundamental change made by the enquiring judge had come to nought. Once again the core political/media establishment that runs the country were allowed to remain unregulated, deciding what best served their interests.
And all this when our self-regulated media were once again doing what led to the Leveson enquiry in the first place -subjecting a vulnerable individual to the glare of negative publicity with the justification that the story was in the public interest.
One can only hope that the suspected suicide of the nurse Jacinta Saldanha will weigh heavily on the conscience not just of the Australian DJ’s who made that fateful hoax call to King Edward V11’s hospital, but all the journalists who ran and spread a story of little consequence other than it involved the unnecessarily , tragic death of a human being.
In The Independent today , editor Chris Blackhurst argues that while he cannot excuse this “thoughtless prank”, people “play jokes all the time” and “now and again, the consequences are out of proportion to the jape.” Once again the gut instinct of journalism – here expressed by the editor of a newspaper that claims the moral high ground-is to defend itself or claim mitigating circumstances rather than admit the profession may be at fault and out of touch with the street.
