Condon: MPS 'needs to totally recalibrate how it provides information to the public'
The former commissioner of the Metropolitan police, Lord Condon, has warned the Leveson inquiry against "a massive bureaucratic overreaction" when tackling the issue of relationships between the press and police officers.
Condon, who retired from the police in 2000, said that while he acknowledged that clearer guidance was needed to avoid malpractice, including better checks, auditing and monitoring of police-press links, having too strict rules was not helpful.
"There could be a massive bureaucratic overreaction which won't help anyone," he told the inquiry today. "If you want to deal with malpractice, it's about having very clear roles, a programme of education and information so that everyone in the organisation is aware of what's acceptable and unacceptable."
He later added: "Based on my knowledge of the police service, they will be chomping at the bit to be doing the right thing in relation to these issues. The challenge is to find something which avoids the massive bureaucracy which will be superficial and something that really hits the spot, that does encourage change that is lasting."
Condon said that in his time as commissioner of the Metropolitan police in the 90s, a small number of editors and leader writers dominated the media agenda around policing – but that the internet now made it much easier for the force to open up to the wider public.
"Commissioners – up to and including me – if they wanted to stimulate discusson, they had to be working with the media," he told the Leveson inquiry. "That has been transformed by the internet, the world wide web and social media. The police service now has different challenges and fundamentally more opportunities to communicate directly with the public."
He later added: "You have police officers that are tweeting, blogging. The service is at a point where it needs to totally recalibrate how it provides information to the public via the media and social media."
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