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February 2, 2006

Hidden underneath the headlines, or behind others' bylines, more and more of the UK's news is being collected, processed and distributed by just one large, and growing, organization. Adam Christie looks at what has been happening and why.


PA's news monopoly extends its reach

LISTEN to any day's review of the papers on the Today programme, and it would be easy to get the impression that each has its own huge newsgathering operation.

In London, each of the nationals may have staff reporters to cover Whitehall, Westminster, the high courts and repel the enthusiasm of the capital's PRs.

Elsewhere, the reality is different. While some, truly local, papers may be able to unearth stories of their own, they have become forced to rely on the monopoly of PA for court, business and national coverage.

The BBC may claim to have the world's largest 'newsgathering' operation, but relatively few of the Corporation's hundreds of journalist are 'primary' reporters, out and about, their ears close to the proverbial ground, making and developing contacts, gleaning tip-offs and following up hunches.

Evening and regional morning papers, commercial radio and television stations operate under similar constraints. Reporters are under pressure to fill space or airtime, on shifts that are understaffed, leaving them unable to escape from their desks, online computers or umbilical telephones.

That pressure gets worse overnight, at weekends and during the silly seasons of August and Christmas holidays.

Monopoly by default
So, almost by default, PA has become the UK's monopoly reporter. Some smaller agencies exist, and are profitable, but it is PA which has the contracts with most publishers and broadcasters.

Few freelances now see livelihoods in court reporting. Some can survive, usually by covering several hearings almost simultaneously at crown courts, but there are far fewer than there were. Buying material from them can add to the burden of duty editors, who must then justify the spending, a task that may not be worth the hassle.

So, unless there is something 'on diary' and a radio or television station knows about an event in advance, coverage will depend - almost by default - on PA. Handouts may devoured, often verbatim and without checking, but it is PA that provides much, if not most, of any news organisation's basic material.

PA monitors their users too, cannibalistically recycling what little original reporting may have been in one paper, or broadcast on the Today programme or Breakfast with Frost, so others can regurgitate that copy.

Papers may top-and-tail PA copy with their own reporters' words, and bylines; radio stations may get anyone who happens to be around the newsroom at the time to 'voice' the same material, but the material has still come from the one source.

Editors appear to invest PA with a credibility that is generous, largely uncritical and may not always be convenient. Copy may be ordered from PA, but with, say, only one reporter covering a large area, it may be late afternoon before a report from an early morning hearing is written and filed.

Reliability
It is easy to forget that a story may not be worth using, even if PA has covered it and filed copy. Indeed, the managing editors now overseeing the BBC News Online operation from Birmingham prescribe PA as authoritative.

Yet how reliable is the copy? PA has managed reasonably well to maintain the historic quality of the material it circulates. As a commercial organisation that is itself under financial pressure, its managers face the hard decisions of balancing maximum productivity, using human and other resources at optimum capacity, with accuracy and authority.

Commerce loves monopolies, simply because competition is expensive. Market economies only function when regulation is imposed to enforce competition (and increase costs for the end users).

Many cities and counties now have local paper monopolies, even though the perspective across the UK as a whole is more diverse. The legislators who enforce regulation when potential monopolies threaten political interests may not have appreciated this - or how PA has become the single news provider for most.

PA is a trusted news source. But trust is always delicate. With PA under as much pressure as any other news organisation to deliver profits, commercial practice presents a major threat to that trust.

There may be a greater quantity of news than ever hitting the airwaves or filling the column centimetres, but the quality in terms of the breadth and diversity, of the stories being covered has declined - and more has very much become less.

TODAY, as for decades, most journalists start their duty newsdesk shifts at daily and weekly regional and local papers, local radio or regional television stations by making check calls - but the quality and quantity of what is found and reported has changed.

Two decades ago, hospitals would be on that list, as well as the police and fire services. Reporters would probably get directly through to the duty police inspector, the duty fire office and a charge nurse in the accident and emergency department. Tips from one could be checked with the others.

Indeed, one memorable Monday, early in the 1980s, a call to the police about the weekend workload elicited nothing, while, a few minutes later, a nurse at the town's hospital revealed that two people had been brought in with knife wounds.

Calling back did get a police admission that there had been a nasty brawl outside a pub - and a good splash.

Binge drinking may have changed town centre Friday nights since then, but difficulties in getting such information from a hospital - without personal contacts who might be putting their jobs at risk by breaching confidentiality rules - has significantly reduced the chances of finding such stories. Hospital managers, and the commercial PRs many employ, seem to relish the protection that 'medical confidentiality' provides.

Secondly, the growth of the media, especially in terms of 'no budget' local radio news, means there are now so many calls for the police and fire services to deal with that details of incidents are recorded on 'voicebanks' for journalists to call.

The 'service' provided by the civilian and uniformed officers responsible for these answering machines varies greatly. In some counties, it can take three or even four days for the police to release details of a road accident or the discovery of a body. Others record them and issue e-mail releases within minutes.

Checking has become difficult too. Although many police and fire services have media officers, getting hold of them outside normal office hours is not always easy.

For journalists, voicebanks are single sources. Fires may be more visible than many police operations, but for most of the time, journalists only get - and report - what the police want to disclose - and how healthy is that?

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