All newspaper editors are committed to press freedom, are they not? During the Leveson inquiry, some editors devoted considerable space to telling readers that they were fighting for the people’s right to know.
So how did they react to the Guardian’s 10-year struggle, and eventual court victory, that resulted in the publication of letters between Prince Charles and government ministers?
Did they applaud the Guardian for its expenditure of time and resources in order to reveal the pressures applied by the heir to the throne on elected politicians? Did they hell.
The Daily Telegraph’s leading article makes no mention of the Guardian’s efforts. Indeed, it finds it “regrettable” that the supreme court “allowed the letters to be released”. The Prince “should be entitled to have a private exchange of views with ministers”.
The paper also ran a piece by historian Andrew Roberts in which called the Guardian “foolish” for its fight in “forcing these letters into the public domain”.
The Times, even though its leading article was critical of Prince Charles for meddling in politics, managed to overlook the Guardian’s role in exposing the meddling.
The paper argued that “it was right to disclose [the letters]” because “a letter from the prince is not just a letter, but a form of pressure”.
It also contended that it was “disappointing that £375,000 of public money” was “spent on legal battles trying to keep their contents secret”. But it could not bring itself to praise the Guardian for pursuing the matter.
The Sun, the paper that routinely intrudes into people’s privacy, thought the Guardian had secured “a hollow victory”. “The Oxbridge revolutionaries” had “battled for years to uncover the confidential documents” which did no more than “prove is that the prince is well-meaning, reasonable and polite”.
Then there is the Daily Mail, scourge of the Leveson process for its supposed threat to freedom of the press. Well, the paper certainly agrees with the disclosure:
“Unmistakably, the prince sought to use his position to influence public policy. So surely the public had the right to know what he was up to.
May the Mail humbly suggest that if he doesn’t want the public to know about his meddling, he shouldn’t do it?”
So surely the Guardian deserves a pat on the back... I’m afraid not. Paul Dacre just couldn’t bring himself to give credit where it was due.
The Mail also ran an article by Stephen Glover in which he contended that “if the Guardian hoped to discredit [the prince] it has signally failed”.
This fails to take account of the fact that the Guardian fought its freedom of information case on the basis that, whatever the content, the prince’s lobbying was itself of public interest. Its own leader makes that clear:
“The importance of these papers is not whether they reveal the prince’s controversial (or not) views on the European Union directive on herbal medicines. The importance is what they say about his judgment and its constitutional implications”.
The Daily Mirror was delighted that “the public is at last free to read Prince Charles’s black spider memos to politicians” because “in a democracy, people should have a right to know the issues a constitutional king-to-be is raising with government ministers”.
But there was no word about the newspaper that ensured they have, at last, been revealed to the people.
And the Independent? A long leader, Memos put an end to the ludicrous idea that Britain’s monarchy is politically neutral, made out a reasonable case for disclosure. But it did not mention the Guardian’s part in having brought it about.
That’s press solidarity for you. One paper succeeds in a press freedom campaign. All its rivals devote pages to the consequent revelations. And none bother to congratulate it for its efforts. Truly, the Guardian is a paper apart.