One of the fundamental differences
between genuine democracies and totalitarian regimes is a free press.
For a free press to operate effectively, governments must accept that
their decisions and policies will be challenged, interrogated,
investigated and analysed by people acting independently and using
whatever legal means are available to them. It can be desperately
uncomfortable, and sometimes even unfair. Very occasionally, as for
Richard Nixon over Watergate, it can be politically fatal. But the
alternative is far worse.
The case of David Kelly, the Ministry of Defence weapons expert who
ministers "outed" as the source of Andrew Gilligan's story that the
government exaggerated Iraq's weapons capability, raises crucial questions
about the operation of a free press and the relationship between
government and journalists.
There is no question that Gilligan's report for the BBC's Today
programme was explosive. There is no question that it made the
government's position uncomfortable - perhaps even untenable - on the
reasons for going to war. And there is no question that Alastair Campbell,
in particular, was apoplectic about the allegations being made.
The BBC response was robust, defending not only Gilligan's journalism,
but pointing out a similar and completely independent report on Newsnight
four days later: its science correspondent Susan Watts also reported a
conversation with "a senior official", saying that intelligence services
came under heavy political pressure to include evidence that weapons of
mass destruction could be ready for use within 45 minutes.
While the Newsnight story went unchallenged, battle raged over the
authenticity of Gilligan's source. Then, a name "emerged" from the
Ministry of Defence. Dr Kelly was named by ministers, who insisted that he
came forward voluntarily after "discussions with a colleague".
We can speculate on the nature of those discussions, but one thing is
clear. The political pressure to find a name - to switch from an
institutional assault on the BBC to the identification of a single (and
therefore more vulnerable) individual - was intense. It was clearly not
going to be possible for a government whose reputation for honesty and
integrity was already in terminal decline to discredit BBC journalism when
the whole of the BBC, from its chairman downwards, was standing foursquare
behind their journalists. But if they could nail down the individual
source and discredit that there might be some chance of a respite.
The games-playing that followed was a travesty of the principles of a
free press, and a disgraceful display of political chicanery. Every
politician and every journalist knows the rules: it is axiomatic to the
operation of a free press that no journalist will ever name their source,
because the vast majority of information would dry up if there was any
risk of exposure.
In issues such as defence and security, where sources are usually in
breach of the Official Secrets Act, no one would talk. Governments would
be free to spend money corruptly, take ill-judged decisions or implement
undemocratic policies without fear of public scrutiny.
In defence and security matters, more than any other area of public
reporting, the source/journalist relationship is central to this
democratic process of scrutiny and interrogation. Alastair Campbell, a
journalist, knows that better than anyone. So do defence secretary Geoff
Hoon and prime minister Tony Blair.
Their public calls for the BBC to cofirm or deny that Dr Kelly was
their source were not just a disingenuous attempt to ignore the rules;
they were a deliberate, disgraceful attempt to undermine the foundations
of genuine journalistic inquiry in a desperate pitch to shore up their own
credibility.
In the light of what has happened, BBC journalists may be asking
themselves whether they should have behaved differently. It is hard to see
how. The nature of their investigation goes to the heart of how a free
press should operate independently and in the public interest.
The government, however, cannot be let off the hook. It has
demonstrated a profound contempt for the most basic conventions governing
relationships between press and politicians. It is possible that, as a
result, a man has died.
As a price to pay in the battle for political survival, that is
unforgiveable.
· Steven Barnett is professor of communications at the University of
Westminster.
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