Up to a point, Lord Lebedev
Posted on Thursday 22 January, 2009
Filed Under Uncategorized
IS IT just me, or have recent decades witnessed a sharp drop in the average quality of national newspaper proprietors in this country?
The great press barons of the early and mid twentieth century – out and out rightwingers, one and all – were important political players, as every standard history of the period testifies.
Not for nothing did prime minister Stanley Baldwin attack them for the exercise of ‘power without responsibility’, adding the lapidiary coda that this constitutes ‘the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages’.
Small wonder Lord Northcliffe turned down the offer a cabinet portfolio in 1916; when you calls the shots at the Daily Mail, the Daily Mirror, the Observer and the Times, why trade down?
In the 1930s, Associated Newspaper chief Lord Rothermere – openly sympathetic to Hitler, not to mention the British Union of Fascists – was instrumental in generating the climate of public opinion in which appeasement flourished.
Daily Express owner Lord Beaverbrook held ministerial office in both world war one and world war two, and it is largely through his patronage that Michael Foot became a substantial public figure.
Only Rupert Murdoch, whose favour is still widely regarded as a prerequisite for any political party desirous of forming the government in this country, can be regarded as almost on a par with the giants of the past.
Otherwise, entire stables of national newspapers have been controlled by the likes of Robert Maxwell. Cap’n Bob, as he was known, was a bent Labour MP who worked for as many intelligence services as would put him on the payroll, conducted obsequiously fawning interviews with sundry East European Stalinist hardliners, and ended up throwing himself off his yacht after nicking £400m from the Mirror Group pension fund.
Conrad Black, the Thatcherite peer who once owned the Telegraph titles, is currently doing time in the US for fraud and the obstruction of justice.
Today’s Express boss Richard Desmond is a failed drummer, a reference only musicians among the readership are likely fully to appreciate. Ironically, it is precisely the fortune he made by paying harlots to get their kit off for the camera that allowed him to go on to usurp their privileges.
I didn’t think things could get any sillier than that, and now it just has. Not content with snapping up the odd premiership club, Russia’s oligarchy is buying into the UK media.
Alexander Lebedev – a former KGB man who became a billionaire on the back of rigged sell-off of USSR state assets in the 1990s – is to take a controlling stake in the Evening Standard.
Early indications of what he wants to do with the title are contradictory. Officially he is committed to maintaining its independence; in an interview with the Financial Times, he says he will use it ‘to help Putin fight corruption’, which sounds a bit like promising to back Jonathan Ross in the struggle against the use of profanity on television. Tip to Andrew Gilligan; start studying Cyrillic.
I’ve got no particular beef on nationalist grounds, and I have no evidence that Mr Lebedev is anything other than a fine and upstanding citizen of his native land. Indeed, I’ve heard it said that the hacks on the papers he owns back home consider him one of the better bosses.
But the Eenin Stannard, as it used to be known from the cry of street vendors in the days before the execrable London Lite drove most of them out of business, is extremely influential within the M25. It may have tipped the balance against Labour in last year’s mayoral contest.
The left hasn’t really debated the issue of media ownership since the early 1990s, when it was put there by the blatantly deleterious impact of Murdoch’s pro-Tory partisanship on the democratic process. It might just be time for the question to be revisited.
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7 Responses to “Up to a point, Lord Lebedev”
Don’t see how Lebedev could drag the Standard down any further. It’s a rag nowadays, hardly any news. The Metro is a better paper. Having said that, democracy needs a functioning press, it needs to provide a platform to critics and just people with something to say. It’s such a shame that in most areas of London, the local paper has been taken over by a national syndicate and all it is interested in is adverts. Gone are the days of photos of local weddings, reports of batty people doing batty things, articles engendering a little civic pride etc etc. It’s just happening on a national scale now. It would be interesting to knowd the figures for newspaper circulaton in coomparison with ten or twenty years ago. I bet it’s falling.
The Hackney Gazette is never dull. Especially the letters page.
only slightly off topic:
SU blog is reporting Morning Star Journalists To Ballot For Strike Action
http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=3434
the interesting point for me was:
“Journalists on the title typically earn less than £18,000 a year, according to the National Union of Journalists. All but one of them are understood to be union members.”
you would have hoped that they’d operate a closed shop?
as you wrote, Dave “The left hasn’t really debated the issue of media ownership since the early 1990s,”
maybe OWNERSHIP is not the issue? but what they do with it? in with the Star
Don’t knock Cap’n Bob too much. In the 1970’s he managed to get millions out of Kim Il Sung for fullpage adverts in the mirror for the joys of Juche and the Pyongyong road to socialism. A joy to read.
“… adding the lapidiary coda”
What does that phrase mean? I’m nearly fifty, really quite clever and well educated, lived in this country all my life, and the best translation I can find for the word “lapidiary” is that it has something to do with gemsmiths or jewellers. I do know what a coda is and can guess what it means but honestly, that phrase is not English as any of us know it.
TALKIN’ BOUT THE (UK) MEDIA…
“The BBC has defended a decision not to air a TV fund-raising appeal for Gaza, saying it wanted to avoid compromising public confidence in its impartiality (WHATTTTT?!!!)….A corporation statement added there were also doubts about “the delivery of aid in a volatile situation”.
DEC (Disaster Emergency Committee) said there was “clear evidence” the British public wanted to help.
In a statement, the BBC said: “The BBC decision was made because of question marks about the delivery of aid in a volatile situation and also to avoid any risk of compromising public confidence in the BBC’s impartiality in the context of an ongoing news story.”
ONE MORE TIME:
“the BBC’s impartiality in the context of an ongoing news story.” …”impartiality”…LOUD BLOODY LARFTER.
THE BBC…TOTALLY GUTLESS,LEADERLESS AND DIRECTIONLESS.
What is NOW the point of it?
‘In tandem, Jobcentre Plus groups will be located in children’s centres to advise parents on work. A government document says: “Many [parents] would never consider visiting a JCP particularly if their partner is already working, but may be more receptive to the services in a relaxed setting like children’s centres.”
A parallel scheme has already worked in health centres with Jobcentre Plus staff trained to do basic medical work, such as injections. The staff from the job centre would also advise on back-to-work strategies for people previously hard to reach. The scheme is being promoted by the work and pensions minister Kitty Ussher.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jan/23/free-childcare-purnell-benefit-reform
Has anyone seen this in the Guardian?, its pretty incredible really and a sign of just how advanced the welfare reforms are advancing. DWP staff are acting as erstatz nurses in G.P’s surgeries, isn’t any professional body opposing this? they are like ’spys in the cab’ for claimants.I don’t think such schemes even exist in welfare intolerant U.S