License to grill.

IT IS to be expected that in a year which has involved Ryan Giggs, superinjunctions and a phone-hacking scandal some politician would get up on his hindlegs and blame everything on an unfettered Press.

Journalists always get the blame when they catch someone out, not least by the person who was caught. Ho-hum and fiddle-de-dee.

Already this year there's been calls for privacy laws, largely made by people who want publicity when they feel like it and secrecy when they don't. And today Shadow Culture Secretary Ivan Lewis - himself exposed by tabloids for pestering a young female aide with inappropriate texts - will tell the Labour Party Conference he wants to see licensing for journalists, with a system of "being struck off" if they're guilty of gross misconduct so they'll never work again.

Except - who's in control? Whether it's a privacy law or licensing, someone has to administer it. Someone who can draw a line in the sand which every single person in the country would agree with.

Politicians? Ooh, no thanks. We'd never know about MPs' expenses if we did that. I haven't forgotten, although they have, how many MPs excoriated the Daily Wellygraph for paying £75,000 for stolen data, criticised the 'intrusion' and urged the then-Speaker of the House of Commons to pursue court action and injunctions to plug the leak. We also wouldn't know about a dodgy dossier which took our country to war in Iraq on a lie, a Home Secretary's attempts to prosecute an Opposition MP for publicising a damaging leak about her own department, Jeffrey Archer's perjury and a million and one other stories. If a politician decided who could write the news we'd end up with a Government press release to read over our cornflakes every morning.

Judges? They'd stick to the law, surely, and be impartial. Except in the case of celebrities, privacy, superinjunctions, and stories about other judges. Lawyers are over-cautious to the nth degree and tend to err on the side of 'never publish something that someone somewhere might not like and might, with a squint and a following wind and not looking at the evidence be a little bit ripe for an old man who doesn't watch the X Factor to understand'. If a judge censored our news today's editions would be tied up in legal fannying-about until some point after Christmas and would look something like this:

Or how about the media itself? People like me with a vested interest in sticking our noses in everywhere, willy-nilly. No, probably not a good idea for us to be in sole charge either. The police could enforce censorship I suppose, but there's a few nations trying that already and I don't much fancy newspapers like they have in Saudi Arabia.

Perhaps we could ask the public? Very democratic. Except we don't want Mrs Miggins at no74 to have a say, she's a dreadful racist. And that bloke across the way, the one with the loud music and all the girlfriends, he can't be relied on. No it will have to be the bits of the public that are well-behaved, polite, dress the right way, shop in the right places, think the same way as... oh. Not so many of them, are there? And let's not forget the public voted for Hitler, the public buy Coldplay records. They cannot always be trusted.

And how do we define gross misconduct? Having to make a payment, or an apology, or being found to break the Code of Conduct? I know of dozens of stories where newspapers have paid to settle-out-of-court because it's cheaper than fighting it and budgets are tight. I've had to write apologies to someone I know, but just cannot prove, to be guilty and most hacks have fallen foul of the code at some point by genuine mistake. Some of the reporter's tricks I think are right or wrong others disagree with; one hack's gross misconduct is another's prize-winning scoop. And heaven forfend we have to start licensing every blogger who calls themselves a journalist.

When  it comes to controlling the Press there are problems with every option, flaws so bad it makes you raise your eyebrows and whistle through your teeth once you think it through. What Mr Lewis and everyone else who bangs on about Press regulation has forgotten is that we already have it.

The courts and politicians already influence what we can report. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, Contempt of Court Act 1981, defamation laws, and a few words about privacy in the European Convention on Human Rights among other statutes constrict and confine the Press pretty well. The rules get pushed and tested and sometimes broken or changed; those that overstep the mark, quite rightly, get hauled before the beak to explain why and can be fined or jailed if they don't have a good reason.

The public already have a say. Up to 20million people read a tabloid newspaper every day, and millions more read our websites. If they don't like what we do they vote with their feet and their wallets, and we have to try harder. There are many reasons why the Screws of the World closed down but by far the most important is that it had lost the trust of its readers.

Last but not least there's self-regulation. The Press Complaints Commission could do with a few more teeth but editors take turns to sit on it and judge each other. There's not much room for favouritism. By far the strongest part of the system is that Fleet Street is a meritocracy - if you fail too many times you're out on your ear. If you get a reputation for costing your newspaper thousands in libel payouts you won't get another job easily. If you mire your newspaper in scandal The Editor will not look on you kindly, unless you're called Johann Hari and we've yet to see if his career survives long-term.

I do not want any one of those people to have a say in what I am able to report on or read. I want ALL of them to have a say.

It is far better to have a long, never-ending argument between everyone - a constant tug-of-war keeping the Press, politics and lawyers in check as the public throw their weight behind one or the other, forcing them all to compromise and find a way to muddle along.

It's not a perfect system, doesn't always work as it should, but what we've got right now is the best anyone's managed to come up with. Like democracy, or the Royal Family - there's plenty of flaws and fruitloops but in the end it usually evens out.

No-one's needed a licence to be a journalist in the 300 years since the first paper was printed in Fleet Street. You just have to be nosy and a little bit mad, the kind of person no-one else wants in their club. That's why politicians, judges and the public don't like us, and it's the reason why our Press with all its defects is still free.

Licences for journalists? 

What next, an exam to be Prime Minister?

Letters to Lillys.

WHAT with holidays and other hoo-hahs it's been a while since our last delve into the mailbag, so let's put on our goggles and rubber gloves to see what we've got.

(I know of Fleet Street agony aunts who open their post in just such a way. I see no reason to throw caution to the winds).

First up is this piece about the early release, two-thirds of the way through his sentence, of the man who watched Baby P abused and killed by his stepfather. Some of the newspapers got their knickers in a twist about him being freed, but failed to take Justice Secretary Ken Clarke to task.

Tom said: "You've got to let him out at some point." Richard added: "Great, let's move him in next door to you then." Max said: "Meanwhile Manchester's courts have locked up a fifty-year-old alcoholic for looting a box of Krispy Kreme during a riot. The system really does value property over people."

And Nik pointed out:

"Ken didn't have anything to do with the justice system when Jason Owen was arrested, tried, convicted or sentenced... that was Jacqui Smith. Let's have the right people held accountable..."

Ed: Ken is the one in charge now, so he's the one to ask about it. Otherwise we'd be asking every previous cabinet minister back to the year dot.

Then snoresheet columnist Johann Hari was given a slap over the wrist for making up quotes, misleading his Editor and his readers, and dragging the reputation of his newspaper through the mud, but rather than being sacked was sent to New York for three months. This offer to retrain him the foxy way drew 100 per cent approval.

Justin said: "Bravo!" Rachel added: "Bravo indeed!" And Enid said: "That's just the half of it, Lillys. But I'm afraid he just doesn't get it."

Jill added:

"Brilliant - spot on. And he didn't just set up a fake identity, but he stole the real identity of another (real) journalist to make vile attacks on people he didn't agree with or failed to see he was a living legend. It drove me nuts that so many seemed to think it was an issue of right and left, when it was all about right and wrong, no more, no less. Don't understand at all how he can still be in a job. He'll never have any credibility again."

Tim said: "What bugs me is that there is apparently nothing any of us can do about it - it turns out, as usual, that however badly caught out you get, if you have the brass neck to just ignore everybody you get away with it."

This post about the International Space Station and things to feel positive about on Mondays went down well with Mark, who said: "I do so like your positive blogs. That's not being sarcastic, I really do."

Paul said:

"I very much like your take on the benefits of research and development. I would have so in favour of funding and building the Large Hadron Collider out of a small portion of the bank bailouts and then enjoying the employment, expertise and brand-spanking-new physics leading to patents leading to innovation leading to future revenue all owned by the UK...That would be a way out of our recession. We could be the Hong Kong of Europe, an offshore island of free thinking hard working people not bound by European nonsense."

Martin added:

"You are right about the fact that those innovations might have come about eventually, but having that cutting-edge science, primes the universities and encourages people to take up science and engineering. Just look at how our nation has declined from the one that created Concorde (most engineers will tell you that Concorde was as technically challenging as going to the Moon was) and the jet engine to one now that bales out half-witted mongs who lose our money and then rewards them with a bonus. We are one of the biggest designers and manufacturers of satellites in the world, yet this successful industry is ignored. We give billions to bankers, perhaps we should be giving money to people who make things instead?"

Then ex-minister Elliot Morley became the latest expenses-fiddling MP to be let out a quarter of the way through his sentence and this post compared it to the 2010 Tory manifesto which had promised with a straight face to "clean up Westminster".

Manfred said: "'Tis the rich wot gets the pleasure, tis the poor wot gets the blame."

But Guy pointed out:

"The rules are being followed just as for anyone else. Sentencing is chemin-de-fer. It's just you don't know the rules, only the most egregious cases normally being newsworthy. 'Prison time' means the nominal sentence not the time that will be served in prison. Almost none of them has a previous conviction. All plead guilty and all will have made appropriate protestations of remorse. This is weighed and counted and determines the sentence. A judge if he strays from the guidelines has to produce a solid, clear, allowable reason, if he isn't just going to waste the public's money (many many thousands) getting appealed. Early release likewise is subject to rigid rules, which you have either to be unusually stupid, a maniac, or honestly believe yourself to be innocent and say so, to fall foul of."

Ed: I'm fairly certain none of them has expressed any remorse, and in fact they all spent thousands in legal aid arguing the criminal justice system had no jurisdiction over them. They changed their tune when the same system gave them early parole.

The most popular post by far this week was about Tory minister and millionaire Jonathan Djanogly's.

Rachael said: "That cunning stunt should be in jail." Sam asked: "Will this actually get through though? Will other MPs not see this and do their best to avoid being linked to it in any way? Much like that awful woman Dorries. If only writing to my MP and asking her to fight this had any point whatsoever."

Stuart wrote:

"Jonathan Djanogly is just another example of politicians who are totally disconnected from reality. Multi-millionaires who will never have to worry about money have no concept of the hardships they inflect on the 'average' person with their ongoing stupidity. Let's have a campaign to say that no politician can serve more than two terms in central government whether that's the Commons or the Lords. Once that's done they're banned from public office forever."

And Chris took the time to write a highly personal email which he has kindly agreed can be reproduced in full, with a few changes to prevent him being identified.

"I was an abused husband. In a strange situation: I was a war veteran. I had been raised that one should never lift a hand to a woman, no matter what. The abuse began with verbal insults. Over a short period of months it elevated to being hit with wooden rolling pins about the head because of temper tantrums and my cheek being gouged with surgical tweezers used in a downward stabbing motion; the cause of which I cannot recall. I was between a rock and a hard place. Here was I, a well-built man and a veteran exercising supreme self-control not to allow my self-defence instincts to rule me and hit back. Yet I was looked on by my colleagues as some form of mewling puff (as one chap called me). When I eventually complained to the police they detained me claiming that I had caused injuries to her. Admittedly I had, by scraping the skin off her knuckles where she had repeatedly punched me in the head until I turned around and shoved her onto the floor. I then had to wait seven months until the police dropped the charges with no apology or explanation forthcoming. I appreciate your article, particularly the tone of exasperation. Keep up the good work. Some of us out here are counting on your voice. Admittedly adding to it with my own, less conspicuous, voice. Thank you."

Which is a rather humbling way to sign off. Thank you to Chris for letting me pass his story on to you.

Have a good weekend everyone - we're due a last burst of summer next week.

Foxy out.

You're Hari a laugh.

THE WORST journalists are the ones who don't get it.

The ones who shrug when they hear a contact has had their life threatened after they printed a lie; the ones who think because they survived one screw-up they'll survive the next one; the ones who think power equates with being bullet-proof.

Despite common belief, such journalists are rare. It's exactly the same as in any other industry where there is always one person in your office whose lack of general human decency makes them stick out. In a newsroom the remaining 99% of the staff might be sociopaths but they generally know roughly what morals look like, not least because otherwise we could not do our jobs.

If you don't know right from wrong yourself it's impossible to interview someone with empathy, hard to get the right quote, difficult to see past your own ego to the story and the people in it. If every journalist were like the caricature many people believe us to be we wouldn't be able to spot human interest, much less feel it, and newspapers would not have sold millions of copies for 300 years.

If nothing else a sense of survival keeps you roughly on the straight and narrow. If you make up stories other journos who are made to look bad as a result will stitch you up every chance they get, if you don't stand your round you never get one bought and if most hacks had done what Johann Hari did they would be down the Job Centre quicker than you can say "gross misconduct".

For those as don't know, Johann is the star columnist of a snoresheet which I have not been bored enough to read since I was last in a dentist's. He made reference to polishing quotes in his interviews and a tabloid hack called Brian Whelan did some digging and found that Johann had fabricated entire slabs of interviews, repeatedly, for years. He used quotes his subjects had said or written previously along with heartfelt details about how they were looking deep into his eyes while they said it.

It's not phone-hacking Milly Dowler, but it's still not on. It's a lie, his subjects didn't know about it, and what's more he used such pieces to win a prestigious award for political journalism with a £3,000 pot and a judging panel who, presumably, were unable to use Google.

He was subsequently found to have set up a fake internet identity to discredit critics, accuse other journalists of alcoholism and anti-Semitism, and act as an unofficial Hari cheerleader. I have got drunk with and greatly respect two of his victims, former New Statesman deputy editor Cristina Odone and Observer writer Nick Cohen, who are both fine journos. It was all pretty vicious and - just as with that guy in your office - his behaviour showed more about his own insecurities and character than it did his industry.

He was suspended for two months, was subject to an internal inquiry, has returned his prize (but not the cash) and issued a public apology for most, but not all, of his behaviour.

But he still doesn't get it. And here's why.

Johann Hari disgraced himself and tainted his profession just like Andy Coulson, through hubris and stupidity. He thought he could do whatever he liked because he was Johann Hari, with a big picture byline.

He says he was "wrong and stupid". No mate, you were crap at your job, nasty when you were found out, and you just didn't care. You were incapable of drawing the right quote out of your subject, unable to see beyond your own prejudices to report fairly and accurately, and more importantly did not manage to put your monstrous ego to one side and see that you were in the wrong. And you have apologised now only because you must.

It's not all Hari's fault. He was recruited straight from university without ever studying law, shorthand, government or anything else I had to sit an exam in. He never had to chat his way across a doorstep, deal with someone threatening suicide or waving a gun, or realised long-term contacts have to like and trust you. He never learned a bit of humility or that everything you write has consequences somewhere.

That's because big-name writers who bring in readers get a little leeway from The Editor. Jeremy Clarkson can be almost as rude as he likes, Su Carroll can pick her own subjects, Richard Littlejohn can write 2,000 words in iambic pentameter if he chooses. But they're still supposed to have a basic grasp of the main rules of their trade and the first and most important of which is: NEVER BECOME THE STORY.

Hari failed on all counts. He's a bad journalist earning a huge salary on a struggling newspaper with tight budgets that can barely afford proper news coverage, staffed by people trying their hardest and each of whom, had they brought their newspaper into the disrepute he has, would have been sacked.
Yet he's not only still in a job, he's on a five-month holiday two months of which were paid, and is "retraining" at Columbia University in the US. How can you retrain someone who was never trained in the first place?

Well, in the certain expectation I will never be asked to do it, I hereby offer to train Johann Hari. If he wants to spend three months with me rather than attending seminars on the free press in Somalia I'll not charge him a penny. I will teach him shorthand, lecture him on the Contempt of Court Act 1981 and Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1976, grill him on local government, the council tax system, the defences against defamation and how to win a drinking contest.

I'll send him out on deathknocks, pack jobs, magistrates' hearings, junkie inquests, tell him to drive 300 miles on a hopeless tip at 10pm then insist he's back at work for 7am, make him spend his birthday at a late-night local council planning committee, publish his phone number and paint his name on the side of his car so everyone knows who he is. I'll show him what to do when someone comes at him with a lump of wood or collapses in tears, and how to file off a notebook down a bad line while you're being shot at to someone who's drunk.

It's not perfect and I could probably think of some more stuff but that seems to me like a syllabus which will teach him to care about his trade, the people in it and those he writes about. That, or it puts you off for life.

He probably wouldn't last an afternoon.

He hasn't even got his pen out.