The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) has responded to an open letter drafted by a group of bloggers urging the commission not to regulate blogs.

A letter published on the Liberal Conspiracy blog urges the PCC - the body which currently regulates press online as well as in print, and also the Sun's radio station, SunTalk - not to consider extending its remit to bloggers until its own system for regulating the press has been improved.

"[W]e do not feel that the further development of blogging as an interactive medium that facilitates the free exchange of ideas and opinions will benefit from regulation by a body representing an industry with, in the main, substantially lower ethical standards and practices than those already practiced by the vast majority of established British bloggers," it is said in the letter, which is due to be sent to the PCC, Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the House of Commons culture, media and sport select committee on Friday.

It is also suggested in the letter that the practices of some newspapers 'would be unacceptable amongst established bloggers', for example failing to print corrections when stories are changed.

"Consequently we would suggest that before your even consider turning your attention to our activities, you should direct your energies towards putting your own house in proper order. Should you succeed in raising the ethical standards and practices of the majority of the national press, particularly the tabloids, to our level then we may be inclined to reconsider our position," it said.

"Until that happens, any attempt by the Press Complaints Commission to regulate the activities of bloggers will be strenuously resisted at every possible turn."

The letter, which has so far been signed by around 200 individuals and has generated 348 comments, was written in response to comments made by Buscombe to the Independent's media pages editor Ian Burrell.

"Some of the bloggers are now creating their own ecosystems which are quite sophisticated," Baroness Buscombe told Burrell, who then blogged on the story.

"Is the reader of those blogs assuming that it's news, and is [the blogosphere] the new newspapers? It's a very interesting area and quite challenging."

She said that after a review of the governance structures of the PCC, she would want the organisation to 'consider' whether it should seek to extend its remit to the blogosphere, a process that would involve discussion with the press industry, the public and bloggers (who would presumably have to volunteer to come beneath the PCC's umbrella).

In a pre-emptive letter to Sunny Hundal, editor of Liberal Conspiracy, with today's date and seen by Journalism.co.uk, Buscombe said there was no desire to infringe on the freedom of expression that is 'absolutely paramount' to blogging.

"My point was that, as there is already pressure to increase regulation of the internet, it is important to make clear that this must not lead to some form of statutory interference. Rather, a system of self-regulation (such as exists by the PCC for newspapers) would be more appropriate, if any bloggers wished to go down that route," said Buscombe.

"I say 'wish', because any advance in this area would have to be consensual. Self-regulation is about collaboration between willing parties. The PCC is not in any way constituted to impose its views on the unwilling and cannot simply extend its remit to cover non-newspaper sites."

But Buscombe said she disagreed entirely with the points raised about newspapers' standards, stating that complainants to the PCC feel they are given a good service and the level of adherence by journalists to the commissions' Code of Practice is 'actually very good'.

"[T]he PCC is also involved pre-publication to help ensure untrue or intrusive stories are not published.  This is achieved in a way that preserves freedom of expression (because editors co-operate with it, in contrast to the world of injunctions and super-injunctions)," she added.

Buscombe conceded that there is room for improvement, including the potential for an online catalogue of apologies as suggested by the bloggers in their letter, and that an independent review of the PCC has been launched to facilitate this.

In her Society of Editors conference speech on Sunday, Buscombe also said the PCC should not come under statutory control.

Last week the commission was heavily criticised by the Guardian and Media Standards trust for the conclusions of its inquiry into phone hacking activities at the News of the World. Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger, who resigned from the PCC's code committee last week, called the commission 'worse than pointless'.

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