Law Lecture 7 - Codes of Practice

As with any job, journalism is subject to set Codes of Practice.These act as a way of creating consistency between journalists. They also help to create and build trust between journalists and their audiences. Journalism has three main codes:

The Press Complaints Commission (PCC), which is for papers and magazines

The Office of Communications (OFCOM), for broadcasters

BBC Trust, for regulating output on the BBC.

The reason why these codes matter so much is because they help guide journalists through any ethical issues that they may face and how far it is that you can go.

The PCC is often seen as a toothless tiger. It's self-regulated and has little in the way of impartiality. Whilst it acts as a place to send complaints, in many cases these aren't acted upon (such as the Jan Moir article on Stephen Gateley after his death). It acts as little more than a deterrent as it can force retractions and apologies from editors in their newspapers.

In contrast, OFCOM is far more authoritative. OFCOM has the ability to hand out heavy fines to broadcasters it feels have broken its regulations. For example, it fined ITV £5.6million for the vote rigging scandal several years ago. Beyond fines, it can prevent broadcasters from airing repeats, forced airings of apologies and in worst case scenarios removing their broadcasting license.

For the BBC, the BBC Trust is responsible for upholding the BBC's guidelines. They deal with complaints made directly to the BBC and investigating whether there was any wrongdoing. These guidelines are available to the entire public and serve as a referral to all BBC workers and other journalists. This ensures it has a very user friendly site.

Democracy Live!

Having been recently introduced to the BBC's 'Democracy Live' page I thought I'd have a bit of a gander and see how useful it is as a tool for democracy (and also how useful it is to Journo's!).

'Democracy Live' is a new feature on the BBC that allows people to view Parliamentary meetings for all the major parliaments relevant to Britain, such as the Commons, the Lords, European Parliament and the various assemblies. These are broadcast live online and then recorded and aired when proceedings have finished. Furthermore, this content isn't restricted to those living in Britain either; you can access the website and live streams anywhere.

I personally think that stuff like this is fantastic. It opens up the democratic process to the public and they also get access to the European Parliament, something that people may not take as much interest in as they possibly should (especially with the Lisbon Treaty coming into effect).

I just hope that the public actually makes use of this facility. It's a fantastic opportunity for us to see how politics is played out and to really engage in the democractic process. Admittedly, things like PMQ's have become little more than a chance for some opportunistic soundbites, but still, the thought's there...