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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Now before the break I was speaking to Harriet Harman and Simon Hughes about press reform, the Leveson proposals. Well I’m joined now by Lord Hunt, chairman of the existing Press Complaints Commission. He’s been tasked with transforming it into some kind of new press watchdog but of course that can only happen once politics has been played out, or can it? Well let’s ask Lord Hunt right now. A very good morning to you, Lord Hunt, because you’ve been moving on with the process irrespective of what the politicians have been doing, haven’t you?  Trying to get some kind of reform body; putting your proposals forward?  

LORD HUNT:    Yes, I have. And of course I was very pleased when Lord Justice Leveson endorsed the proposal I originally put for a new body with a fresh approach, fresh start, and then I accepted all his amendments to the original model. So we’re all ready to go to establish independent and effective regulation in the public interest.  

DM: But I mean in a way if you know we’re all talking about the political discussions and the horse trading that will go on tomorrow and perhaps beyond that, I mean is the scenario which is that you and your process, you could have almost a shadow board or a shadow number of representatives appointment because you’ve gone Lord Phillips, you’re looking for independent minded people to be appointed to this body, to pick those independent regulators. You could actually continue with that process irrespective of what’s going on in parliament?  

LH:    Yes I could but I want to ensure that the new body I’ve been appointed to create is Leveson compliant and there is a degree of agreement now amongst the three political parties to reject Leveson’s idea that it should be OFCOM and to endorse the idea of a royal charter which Maria Miller and others in the government put forward in the first place. So I welcome that there is that degree of acceptance but the important thing is to get this new body up and running; it’ll be the first time ever we have a proper regulator of newspapers and magazines.   

DM: But it’s also important that it’s a body that the media organisations themselves trust to get it right. And of course this huge amount of scepticism’s probably not a very strong word, resistance, to the idea of any form of legislation involved in the process and that’s what’s there on the Labour and LibDem side.    

LH:    Yeah, but don’t forget Lord Justice Leveson when he introduced his report said the last thing he wanted was statutory press regulation and that’s been the theme. But don’t forget the people I am working for are the editors and the journalists in the overwhelming majority of publications that had nothing at all to do with any of the criminal acts which brought the whole industry into question and I want to see their judgment restored. I want to see a free press but a responsible press.  

DM: Well, what feedback are you getting from them if there is legislation involved there even though the argument being that the legislation surrounding the royal charter would be to enshrine its independence from political interference even so it is legislation, lots of organisations will read that as the thin end of the wedge.   

LH:    Well there’s a lack of trust and I think the whole of the newspaper and magazine industry has to recognise they have to re-establish public trust and confidence. But I think they’re well on the way to doing that. Don’t forget there are 120 publishers altogether, thousands of editors, and they particularly in the local and regional press who got praised by Lord Justice Leveson. So we ought to be proud of our free press but ensure it’s a responsible press.  

DM: But could this become a body that major media organisations don’t want to sign up to? This is the point I was putting to Simon Hughes. What happens if you get people, organisations just refusing to join up? Yes there is the idea that they would then face exemplary damages not part of this organisation but they may well take advice and say, “Well, I don’t think we will be subject to exemplary damages so we won’t sign up to this body.”  

LH:    Well certainly all those that I’ve consulted who are the publishers, they’ve all agreed to have a new body and a fresh start with teeth probably the strongest press regulatory body in Europe: ability to fine, ability to carry out investigations. They’ve all signed up to that and later have said, “We don’t need statute. It’s the last thing we should do is to send a message across the world that the UK now has a press law.” They don’t want a press law, they just want to be behind me, and they’ve told me this to my face, in setting up this new body. And that’s what I intend to do.  

DM: But haven’t they also been saying to you, as we go back to what I asked you at the beginning of the interview, about you know the people who will sit on this body. They want people who understand their business, don’t they? At the moment it’s been seen, we heard it from Simon Hughes and Harriet Harman saying, “Well, you know it’s like picking the team and refereeing the game yourself at the moment” because you’ve got so many representatives of media organisations on the body. Isn’t the alternative if you’ve got people there who don’t know anything about the business?  

LH:    Well it’s got to be a self-regulatory body. Now when I last appeared here, Dermot, I just reminded everyone that the ideal solution in Lord Justice Leveson’s own words was an independent, self-regulatory body set up by the industry. Now he didn’t’ believe that they would all sign up to it. They have told me they will. That is why he got into the whole business of statutory underpinning. But I don’t want the statutory underpinning to dominate and create some sort of pseudo or quasi statutory press regulation. Let’s just get on with setting up this new body and others will then judge as to whether or not it is indeed independent and effective.  

DM: It’s a very important point, wasn’t it, you pointed out to me before we came on the air that of course in the original Leveson proposals was the issue of OFCOM, the broadcasting regulator, overseeing this body. That seems to have gone away in all the proposals. Now that must please the media organisations?  

LH:    Yes because we descended into a sort of box ticking mentality. Now I’m a regulatory lawyer; I know the last thing you should ever do with regulation is to get into box ticking because people who want to disobey, they can always tick the boxes. The important thing is we should follow the principles set out by Lord Justice Leveson and create this new body that can re-establish public confidence.  

DM: Okay, Lord Hunt, thank you very much indeed for coming.  

LH:    Thank you.  

DM: And you’re watching Murnaghan here on SKY News.