Lord Inglewood: 'Investigative journalism needs financial support''

The chair of the House of Lords communications committee has warned that the debate on the future of journalism must not be "hijacked" by a focus on the past.

Lord Inglewood told Journalism.co.uk that while some "terrible things" have occurred, politicians must not lose sight of the “awful lot of good" that the media does.

"The trouble is when you have a barrel of apples and one goes rotten, that focuses everyone's attention"

"We've got the world and his wife inquiring about these topics and they need to look at the right thing in the right way otherwise we'll end up with an unsatisfactory state of affairs from anyone's point of view."

He said that the phone-hacking scandal had only been uncovered by investigative journalism, and that without it Britain would "look like a slightly more prosperous version of Eastern Europe in the old days".

"If you take away investigative journalism you pull the plug on an important part of the checks and balances in the way this country operates."

You can, if you're incredibly lucky, stumble on a huge scandal and reveal it but an awful lot of it is painstaking. It's almost a form of archaeology and that’s time-consuming, which is by definition expensiveLord Inglewood

The communications committee recently published a report on the future of investigative journalism, which called for fines by broadcast regulator Ofcom or the Press Complaints Commission's successor to fund investigative projects.

Lord Inglewood added that such a fund could be topped up by philanthropic donations, and that investigative journalism needs some sort of financial support.

"You can, if you're incredibly lucky, stumble on a huge scandal and reveal it but an awful lot of it is painstaking. It's almost a form of archaeology and that’s time-consuming, which is by definition expensive.

“Assuming we aren’t bribing policemen all the way along the line it’s still going to cost a lot of money.”

“It is important that enough resources are available in society for investigative journalism to take place and that the resources are made available.”

The report also said allowing charitable status to organisations producing investigative journalism could help with the "profound" challenges facing it.

Lord Inglewood described the current legal and regulatory system as a "muddle", but stopped short of advocating a general public interest defence for journalists. He said this was because it was not likely to get political support, and that "there are certain things which could be discovered and uncovered by investigative journalism through breaches of the law which no jury is going to convict on".

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