Ex-director of public prosecutions calls PCC 'farcical'

Leading lawyer Sir Ken McDonald has called the Press Complaints Commission “farcical" and said that media organisations should leave the organization for independent regulation of the press

Macdonald, a visiting professor of law at the LSE and the former director of public prosecutions, was speaking at an event on the freedom of the press. He said:  "The press may think the PCC works, but they are living in a dream world. Nobody else does."

Also attending the event were editors and lawyers, including Max Mosley, ex TV presenter Anna Ford, and the editors of the Guardian and Financial Times.

The recent overturning of England football captain John Terry’s super-injunction, not to mention Portsmouth manager Avram Grant's injunction threat over the revelation of his brothel visits, has pushed the issue of privacy and the surging costs of defamation cases into the limelight again.

Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger said the PCC described recent investigations as "embarrassing" and said its current review should decide whether it should be a regulator or a mediator.

Bob Satchwell, director of the Society of Editors, said statutory regulation would be worse, while Eric Barendt, media law professor at University College London, praised the PCC's "valuable free remedy" for people outside the public eye.

Source: Guardian

Published on: 05/02/2010 12:08:00