Archive for October, 2009

Time and again I find myself asking: what is the European construction all about?  What  are we really trying to do here. By what criteria will we judge where we have succeeded and where we have failed? What is the big picture?

Of course different people, different parties, will hold different views, views which, moreover, may change over time. But as is usual in politics those things that divide us are actually rather fewer and less important than the great issues on which there is overwhelming agreement.

What we debate, nationally or on the European stage, are really just the pathways, aren’t they, to these common goals.  Goals that are not defined exactly but which we Europeans all broadly accept – democracy, the rule of law, peace, the human rights agenda, the social market economy, gender equality, a commitment to the environment and biodiversity, to inclusiveness and tolerance, to freedom, to social justice in the wider world, to learning and cultural appreciation.  We look forward to the day when such values are common across the globe.  These are the ‘woods’ in which we live our lives. The direction in which we want Europe to evolve.

But as is often the case in woods we become so busy looking at the trees that we lose sight of this bigger dimension. The European Parliament – parts of it at least – is particularly prone to this sort of thing, with an unfortunate tendency to focus on the detail of a proposal or a sectional interest rather than keeping its eyes firmly fixed on the broad direction in which we want Europe to go.

Thus it was that last week that the Parliament turned down, by the narrowest of majorities, proposals designed to enhance the freedom of the press in Europe.

Now press freedom must surely be one of those broad aims about which few people would disagree. Voltaire’s words – about disagreeing with what you say but defending unto death your right to say it – have been used so often that they have almost become a cliché.  Given that much of Europe’s press in the 20th century was subject to dark and savage controls, you would think that the European press would now be the shining exemplar to the rest of the world.

Well, it isn’t.  Reporters without Borders compiles an index of press freedom and this year’s index – also published last week – shows how poor are the press freedom ratings for certain EU members. Bottom of the list is Romania at 50 (out of 149 countries), but Italy in 49th place, Spain in 46th, Slovakia in 45th and France at 43rd, head a sinking list of shame.

True the Scandinavians come out top. They are better than most of us at practicing what they preach.  But for the press of leading large European nations – such as Italy and France, – to figure so low down the list is an indictment of how we little we value free speech.

The situation is particularly acute in Italy where the concentration of media outlets and their ownership by companies controlled by Italy’s Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, is particularly worrying.  Many think his control of both government and media in Italy is profoundly undemocratic.

But let us not imagine that this is only an Italian problem, which is how it was characterized by those opponents of the press freedom measures in the European Parliament.  They said that it was wrong to look to a European solution for a national problem.  If the premise on which that line were based was correct – that is, if the state of press freedom in Europe were simply an aberration caused by the eccentric Mr Berlusconi – it would be a justified argument.  But it is not.

Press freedom is being eroded all over Europe.  What freedom of information legislation gives with one hand, government secrecy claws back with the other.  Dissembling by governments, gagging orders, secret reports (to which the European Parliament itself seems particularly prone where its own internal workings are involved), all erode the principles of openness and transparency on which good democratic government should be based.

There are many pressures on the media – not the least of which is financial. This leads to a concentration of the press in a few hands. Journalists, with jobs on the line, are clearly likely to refrain from stories and investigations that they know would be ‘unhelpful’ to their proprietor.  The more the press is concentrated, the more it is curtailed.

It doesn’t help that the press itself does not (or will not) recognise the threats it faces. Valdo Lehari Jr., President of the European Newspaper Publishers’ Association (ENPA) was quoted last week as warning that EU legislation on media pluralism and concentration “could in fact decrease, not increase the level of media pluralism,” adding in a somewhat spurious aside that “the EU cannot regulate diversity, just as it is impossible to regulate ethics and morals.”

No one is talking about the EU regulating ethics and morals.  What we are talking about is raising press standards.  We are talking about the courage to be open, the courage to publish, the need for European governments and European institutions not to pussy-foot, but to be robust in their defence of free speech, even at the risk of upsetting the religious, the powerful, the sectional interest.

So last week, in a resolution cast by the Socialists, the Greens and the Liberals, the European Parliament had the opportunity of laying down a marker, of drawing a line in the sand, of saying that in the matter of press freedom we shall and we will fight.  Of identifying press freedom with that great web of issues that form the backbone of our European political agenda.

Sadly, they flunked it. In a straight debate between left and right, the forces of conservatism conserved while some voices in the muffled middle appear not to have understood the importance of the question.  The vote was lost by a margin of three. 13 members abstained.  It was all deeply depressing.

Still,  the day after Parliament presented the €50,000 Sahkarov Prize for Freedom of Thought to Memorial – a Russian NGO that campaigns against human rights abuses in parts of the old Soviet empire where journalists pursuing their trade are snuffed out with brutal regularity.

I just wonder whether any of the 338 who voted against the press freedom resolution spotted the irony.

Picture shows a tribute to Natalya Estimorova, a journalist murdered in Chechnya earlier this year.