Write-Place

As the House of Commons debates the phone hacking scandal and the conduct of newspapers, July’s issue of MaltbyNews is in circulation.(I hesitate to say “delivered to every house in Maltby as it proclaims, as it’s rather a hit and miss affair). Amidst the national discussion on the reliability of the press and the infringement of liberties of the public, Maltby News’ editor Kevin Hall has chosen again to disregard his so called policy of giving the”right to reply’. Rather than respond in his ‘newspaper’ to the libellous comments and untruths that he has previously published he has produced an issue with neither “Letters to the Editor”, an  editorial comment nor the name(s) of the journalists’ who have written the copy. The ‘Events Calendar’ notes the Local Development Framework  Public Consultation dates for Bramley and Wickersley but omits Maltby. Two Maltby Town Council News Pages (at a cost of £300) have a competition entry form with last year’s date on. If it wasn’t for th...

There's been much in the media recently of injunctions and privacy laws. The PM has said the law should be reviewed to " catch up with how people consume media today" and that   it's unfair that newspapers couldn't name individuals whose identity was being widely circulated on the internet. Twitter and Facebook, emailing and blogging is a major part of daily life fo r most of us - well, you wouldn't be reading this now if that wasn't the case.   I know from personal experience that views and perspectives that the public take from the media are not always the full story. Newspaper reports are often taken as ‘gospel’ and our local newspapers in particular have a duty to represent all views and rectify false accusations. Once something is written it becomes fact for some people and no amount of further evidence will change their views. Over the past 18 months there have been many instances of defamation and libel against me and my friend on the letters page...