Privacy and Injunctions - Evidence - Parliament

Phil Hall, chairman, PHA Media and former editor of the News of the World and Hello! and
Max Clifford, Max Clifford Associates Ltd—Oral evidence (QQ 1456–1510)
speak to that source. We’re going to ring them up and have a conversation with them.”
Personal responsibility is very important. I am sorry I have gone off the subject slightly. You
asked whether you can have a statute to protect children. I think it is very difficult.
Otherwise, you would have a picture of the Manchester United team at Old Trafford and
you would have to pixelate every child’s face. That is plainly ridiculous because the parents
choose that as a family situation. I think that editors have to make choices. Those choices
are often made willingly but sometimes they are made in conjunction with the Press
Complaints Commission.
Q1475 Baroness Corston: We have had evidence to the effect that if a child is
used for a photograph on a football pitch, or in OK! or Hello! magazine in a family context,
the right to privacy is relinquished because the children have been commoditised. Are both
of you saying you disagree with that?
Phil Hall: I disagree with it because circumstances can change. Think of an extreme
case where somebody is on a football pitch with their children and photographs are taken,
and then the couple are getting divorced in acrimonious circumstances and the children are
going into court for a custody hearing. I do not think that because they appeared in
photographs at a football match they should lose all their right to privacy in a difficult
emotional situation. Certainly, you have to be very careful about intruding into grief. As a
newspaper editor, I have spoken to people who are grieving and they are happy for
photographs to be taken. It is very hard to put these things into statute. People have to
make personal decisions and be responsible for them as editors or journalists.
Max Clifford: To me, it is very simple. Children deserve maximum protection, and
they are not old enough to decide whether or not they appear in papers or magazines. In a
situation where someone has just won a major football match or tennis tournament and
their child is there, it is a happy picture and one that everybody enjoys. I do not think
necessarily that Wayne Rooney, or whoever it is, should then face the argument, “Well, you
were happy to have their picture in the paper then. Therefore, we have free range to do
what we want.” To me, that is totally wrong.
Q1476 Lord Dobbs: It is very interesting that so much of what you have already
said today is about protection, whereas your reputations have been established on
promoting individuals. I remember 20 years ago Max and I appeared on a chat showwhere
we discussed issues about the protection of your clients. How much of your work is
keeping things out of the newspapers rather than putting them in?
Max Clifford: When I started out in the 1960s it was probably 80% to 90%
promotion and 10% protection. The first thing I ever stopped was a story involving one of
the stars of Tamla Motown, which we launched in this country. He was having an affair with
one of the girls in my press office, so I stopped it coming out. That was a rarity. In the last
20 years it has probably become by far the biggest part of my business not just for stars but
companies and organisations I work with all over the world, the chairmen of companies, et
cetera. Whereas for the first 20 years of my business the emphasis was on promotion, by
far the biggest part now is protecting people from the excesses of the media and the
individuals.
432