Max Mosley on Privacy

The Rule of Law.

What’s interesting about The Rule of Law is that it’s written by someone who was until very recently the UK’s most senior judge, Lord Bingham. It’s comforting because it shows that the highest level of the judiciary is really interested in the liberty of the individual and freedom in all its various guises. It’s also got all sorts of fascinating little pieces in it. For example, he criticises the way in which the Americans put certain prisoners outside the reach of their courts in Guantanamo Bay and mentions that the executive in England was doing exactly the same thing, putting prisoners beyond the reach of the courts, more than 300 years ago. But then there was an act of parliament to stop it, the Habeus Corpus Amendment Act of 1689. The book is a general look at aspects of the law which effectively guarantee the freedom of the individual. The rule of law is one of the two great pillars of democracy, the other, obviously, being the vote. But it’s probably more important than the vote, because the vote is only once in a while, but the rule of law determines the rules which everyone, including the authorities, must follow on a daily basis and is the greatest guarantee of freedom. So, it’s a very important book

Why were people being put outside the jurisdiction of the courts 300 years ago in England?

That was the Earl of Clarendon, King Charles II’s chief minister, so he could lock up people he didn’t approve of, without them or their friends being able to use Habeas Corpus to force the government to explain why they were being held. Of course, this is an exact parallel with what has been done in the United States more than 300 years later

And why did Tom Bingham feel he had to write this book?

Probably because he thinks the rule of law so important. Serious lawyers see continual attempts by the executive to encroach on the rule of law. If you’re a minister it’s much easier to do things without being constantly challenged in the courts.

Nick Davies, Flat Earth News.

This to me is fascinating because it’s the first time that a top-quality journalist has done a complete exposé on the way in which the media distort what’s going on. He says in his preface that dog doesn’t eat dog. Usually, all institutions are open to criticism by the media except the media themselves. So this is the first time that somebody has actually done it to the media. It’s immensely interesting because he has done a great deal of research and he gives all sorts of examples.

Can you give me one?

Well, he starts off by setting out how the millennium bug was supposed to be a great danger and how the whole thing was really completely invented. How at one point Murdoch completely destroyed a political opponent in Australia with a story that simply wasn’t true. He says Murdoch may not have known it wasn’t true, but it wasn’t, and, of course, the now-discredited story of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Does he say why they’re doing this? Why would it be in a newspaper’s interest to make stuff up?

That’s the interesting thing because he points out that conventional wisdom is that it’s either the proprietors dictating or pressure from advertisers and the need to sell newspapers, but I think what emerges from the book is that it’s a widespread disease and that journalists lose fairly early, or a lot of them do, the fundamental purpose of their job which is to tell the truth. And the point he makes is that if a journalist doesn’t tell the truth then he really ceases to be a journalist in any meaningful sense. And, in fact, failure to tell the truth and willingness to distort is so widespread.

I wonder if that is what journalists feel their job is. I think a lot of journalists probably feel that their job is to go off and have an exciting time and look at things and tell stories and entertain the readers.

Well, I think that’s probably right and it’s certainly what emerges from his book. I think the point he’s making is that the profession of journalism consists of informing the public about things about which they would not otherwise have known. That’s, of course, not necessarily the reason why people buy newspapers, but it is the basic task of journalism. But, as you say, not all journalists see it like that.

No. I think a lot of people think they are telling stories. People read the newspapers over breakfast not necessarily to be better informed but often to be entertained.

That’s absolutely right. But, of course, it does then raise the question of whether those same journalists couldn’t just sit and write fiction. The problem is that what they are doing is writing fiction dressed up as fact. I think that is the fundamental point. If they printed the story in a different colour when it was wholly or partly invented I think that would be less objectionable. I think what is objectionable is to dress up fiction as fact.

Peter Burden on the News of the World.

From my personal point of view this is fascinating because it confirms all sorts of things I have long suspected. For example, he cites two separate instances of couples who were exposed by the News of the World as swingers, that is, people who wanted to involve outsiders in their sex lives.