Media

Tighten up definition of ‘public interest’ to safeguard privacy

13 July 2009

Even if a celebrity culture and the Facebook generation have changed the nature of privacy in Britain, a study published today highlights the right to a private life and the need for a more robust definition of ‘public interest’.
The year-long study, by Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford, says the starting point should be that a private life ‘is itself a considerable and humane public good’ and that any media intrusion into private lives has to be justified by a higher public good.
Noting an increasing use of the Human Rights Act, with media lawyers describing ‘privacy as the new libel’, the report says Naomi Campbell and Max Moseley are just two in a growing list of celebrities and public figures, who are resorting to court action to safeguard their privacy.
Report author, Stephen Whittle, Visiting Fellow at the RISJ and former BBC Controller of Editorial Policy, said: ‘The current allegations about the way in which in the News of the World and other papers have sought to access personal data are a wakeup call to journalism. There is huge public concern about privacy and media intrusion. A robust definition of the public interest is possible. It is already implicit in codes, statements and legislation.‘
The report cites the following characteristics for ‘public interest’:
*Citizens in a democracy have an interest in having access to information about the workings of government, its institutions and its officials, both elected and appointed. This interest also extends to private corporations and to voluntary organisations which require the public’s trust.
* Individuals holding such office in a public or private institution which seeks the public’s trust should be judged for their public acts, not private ones. ‘Private’ should mean issues to do with personal relations, personal communications, beliefs and past affiliations – always assuming these are within the law - however much these appear to others to be deviant, or immoral, or bizarre.
Mr Whittle acknowledges that such an approach runs the risk of missing concealed scandals which impact on public life. But to argue from this, that therefore all potentially compromising private relationships must therefore be investigated for whatever public misdemeanours they may unearth, is unreasonable. ‘There is greater public interest in protecting private life – and that interest must tolerate the occasional missed misdemeanour,’ he says.
The report recommends that media intrusion in support of the ‘public interest’ should be able to demonstrate one of the following: the exposure of fraud, corruption, crime or significant anti-social behaviour; the promotion of accountability and transparency for decisions and public spending; the support of probity and value for money; debate on key issues; the disclosure of information that allows people to make significantly more informed decisions about matters of public importance; or the exposure of incompetence that affects the public.
The report suggests that all media organisations should follow the same approach to intrusion and that the codes of the PCC, the self-regulatory body for the Press, and Ofcom, the statutory regulator for broadcasting, should have a two-stage process: firstly, to justify the intrusion, then secondly, to defend putting the material into the public domain.  
Fellow author and journalist, Glenda Cooper, sums up the need to ensure the right target for the public interest defence: ‘The person who believes in flying saucers or is conducting a sado-masochistic relationship may be a council officer or a department store manager. But this cannot be presumed to affect their behaviour in their job. There is no prima facie public interest in ET believers or in sado-masochists.’  
For more information or to arrange an interview with Stephen Whittle, please contact the University of Oxford Press Office on 01865 280534 or email press.office@admin.ox.ac.uk
The full report is available from the University Press Office  

Notes for Editors:

  • The report ‘Privacy, probity and public interest’ is based on a year-long research project, in which Mr Whittle and Ms Cooper conducted interviews with editors, producers, journalists, media lawyers, bloggers, and victims of media intrusion as well as examining case law and regulatory decisions.
  • It is the sixth study to be published as part of a Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism series called ‘Challenges’, which present findings, analysis and recommendations on media issues. 
  • The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism is University of Oxford’s centre for research into news media. The Thomson Reuters Foundation is the core funder of the (RISJ) Institute, based in the Department of Politics and International Relations. The Institute was launched in November 2006 and developed from the Reuters Fellowship Programme, established at Oxford 25 years ago. The Institute, an international research centre in the comparative study of journalism, aims to be global in its perspective and provides a leading forum for scholars from a wide range of disciplines to engage with journalists from around the world. For more information, go to Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism
  •  Stephen Whittle was the BBC's Controller of Editorial Policy for five years. His role was to ensure that the BBC observed the highest ethical and editorial standards. As Controller, he was involved in some high profile BBC investigations such as The Secret Policeman, Licence To Kill, and a Panorama on the Olympics. Glenda Cooper is a journalist and researcher who has worked for a number of media organisations and was a Guardian Nuffield fellow in 2006. She is also the author of the next Challenge on Disaster Reporting.