A lot of my interview with new director of the Press Complaints Commission Stephen Abell is spent clearing up what falls in the PCC's remit, and what doesn't.
Abell doesn't know, for example, if the governance review will take evidence from the previous director and chairman, as well as the incumbents.
Keen to stress the review's independence from the Commission (it was criticised for being led by a former board member), Abell tells me he can't comment on its procedure but he expects its findings to be published in "late spring", following oral hearings.
At this point, the communications director, Jonathan Collett, sitting in on the interview, interjects to remind me that Abell has been at the Commission for nine years.
"I've been at PCC since 2001, I ran the handling of complaints for four years before I became director so I do know about the whole system," adds Abell.
Abell can't comment on the code committee annual review either: "The code committee is an industry body set up to look at the code, it's not something I have authority over."
So in regards to the question of transparency - why doesn't the code committee review publish the written submissions online - he says he's not in a position to answer: "It's not a matter for me".
Nor can he speculate over the findings of the Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) select committee report on media regulation, privacy and law, expected soon: "It's very dangerous for us to make predictions two weeks before they publish the report. We invited them in twice to see what we do and we'll listen to any recommendations they make."
And he can't comment on the libel law reform campaign: "I think it's not an area we get into - I understand the industry's concerns. [It's] a good example of an issue for the industry, not the PCC."
Abell can, however, tell me about his personal ambitions for increasing the transparency of the PCC. "I'm very keen, and Peta [Lady Buscombe, chairperson since mid-2009] is very keen, to be open about what we do so we've started doing that: every decision by the PCC is now a public record.
"Some of the work is private, particularly in a pre-publication sphere where we give advice to people and help them make their case to newspapers."
His focus is on helping people day-to-day, he says: "It's an important role of the PCC that we help people who take on big media organisations. We offer a public service in that sense and I'm very keen to be open about what we do and release information about we do, so people understand all the work that goes on in the PCC.
"Because I think sometimes, and this is primarily our responsibility, that it can be a little underrated - I want to accentuate the public service aspect of the PCC."
Pre-publication work The PCC does a lot of work behind the scenes, he says, preventing stories reaching publication stage. For example, he cites a case where a famous person's agent prevented a story about his or her mental health being published.
But many high profile names go through the courts. The McCanns, famously (the PCC's former chair, Sir Christopher Meyer, told Parliament he was unable to contact them directly at an early enough stage). Most recently, England football captain John Terry, who attempted to silence the press reporting details of his private life - albeit it with little success.
Why didn't John Terry use the PCC? "I don't know. He elected to go down this route. We do deal with people of that level who use the PCC to discuss their privacy concerns. They come to us; we then share the information with the industry."
Abell preaches the benefits of the PCC over the courts: "It allows newspapers the freedom to make the decision."
"They [complainants] can come without the need for legal representation, and ensure editors act responsibly."
When the PCC is successful in preventing a story, "that's not because of an act of suppression, it's because of an act of responsibility".
"Still there will be the rightful place of injunctions, but John Terry's representatives made a decision about doing this type of injunction in this way."
Rightful place of injunctions? How about 'superinjunctions'? "I think superinjunctions are very dangerous - that people aren't able to know about it."
"I don't think we do cheerlead for the press"
I raise another criticism often cited about the PCC: that it acts as a spokesperson for the press. "I don't think we do cheerlead for the press. I think the press itself doesn't make a very good case for itself. Publicly, it doesn't advocate for itself very well," he replies.
People ask the PCC questions which are better meant for the industry, he adds: "We are entirely removed - we are here to answer complaints about the press".
"It may be there's a bit of a vacuum in terms of who talks on behalf of the press. I think that's a shame for the industry. They could well have someone who goes out there and talks about why they make the decisions they do and what's going on with the industry, but that's not a role for the PCC.
"We should be entirely removed from any kind of cheerleading role and I think we are. You might say there's a criticism; the reality is very much the case that we don't."
Conflicts of interest
Alan Rusbridger, one of the editors most closely connected to the campaign against superinjunctions, resigned from the Editors' Code of Practice Committee last year, following the PCC's handling of the re-opened phone hacking case, a series of stories which saw the Guardian at loggerheads with News International titles.
Last night - after my interview with Abell - Rusbridger labelled the PCC "embarrassing" and said that the body's credibility was "clinging by its fingertips" in a debate with leading lawyers and industry figures.
"[The PCC] needs to ask itself whether, as presently constructed and funded, it is a very effective regulator," Rusbridger said at the time of his resignation.
But Abell is unperturbed by his departure: "The code committee is an industry body. Alan Rusbridger has said it does a good job and he thinks the PCC does a good job in a lot of what it does.
"I think these arguments happens within industries but I think it's perfectly acceptable to move on from that. I don't think it weakens the PCC in any way that Alan is leaving an industry body that he was a member of for a while.
"You don't have every editor on the code committee anyway. I think it's tremendous merit that Alan Rusbridger of the Guardian was on the code committee for as long as he was."
Once we begin broaching the subject of phone hacking, it's all a bit confusing. The PCC published its re-review fairly speedily, following the Guardian's allegations in July 2009 (the implications of the new evidence have created a running story).
The PCC investigated to see if they had been misled in its 2007 inquiry, says Abell: "We didn't feel that we had."
Its new report was received critically: "This report is worse than pointless, it's actually rather dangerous to the press," said Rusbridger, for example.
The CMS select committee, which opened a phone hacking inquiry, has not yet issued its own report. It delayed it to hear from News International CEO, Rebekah Brooks, although it was announced this week that she would submit her written evidence only.
Won't it be embarrassing if the CMS committee comes down hard on News International, when the PCC found no new evidence, despite the Guardian's revelations?
"We'll have to see what happens," is all Abell will say. The communications director interrupts to say that the PCC received all the evidence seen by the CMS committee. "Everything they've done in the open, we're aware of," adds Abell.
Adjudications with clout?
Unsurprisingly, Abell defends the strength of the PCC's adjudications: "It's an interesting one: if newspapers didn't want to avoid the sanction, which is critical adjudication, they wouldn't offer to remedy the complaint because the sanction wouldn't hurt them.
"I think when you speak to editors and they're aware that adjudication is possible, they're very keen to avoid it. The force of a newspaper is guiding people and telling them what to think, helping them to see the world in a certain way, and having to admit fallibility or publish criticism that they have no control over is, I think, a very stinging sanction for a newspaper to have to bear.
"I think you've also got to examine this to make sure the system is functioning. It would be wrong to think the system works perfectly just because it's worked for the last 20 years. I wouldn't want to say that everything should remain as it is, but certainly in my experience is that editors don't want to publish criticisms of themselves in their papers … [while] they're busy criticising other people."
Financial sanctioning wouldn't work, says Abell
How about introducing financial sanctions, as recently voted for by 85 per cent of the respondents in an Ipsos-MORI poll or the Media Standards Trust's suggestion that printed apologies should vary in size, taking up varying levels of advertising space?
While Abell values the MST's work as "constructive" (cf. the previous chairman's view), his "personal view" is that he doesn't think that financial sanctions would work.
"In this market, it's very difficult to gauge financial sanctions: a national newspaper might be able to absorb the financial hit, for a small regional newspaper, it might be enough to close it down."
"We did some public surveying a while ago: most people want prompt redress in the form of an apology, putting things right.
"[There's] a very strong argument that incorporating financial sanctions would lose a lot of what the PCC does well.
"Financial regulatory systems tend to bring with them, not necessarily a statutory, but a statutory-like framework, and I think that could cause more problems than they solve."
The length and terms of adjudications already change, he says. "[The PCC] can control how much the newspaper has to print by the length of its own adjudication. I think the process is already in place."
Abell does seem open to criticism - with less of the stubborn defensiveness displayed by Meyer and Toulmin during the CMS committee hearings, media interviews and in press releases - but it will be perhaps more valuable to return with my questions and criticisms once the reports are published.
Then we might get a better indication of where the PCC is heading in 2011, 20 years from its birth.
Finance reporter - property
