Nick Cohen in the Observer: "Boris Johnson is an ex-journalist who wants to send working journalists to prison. Boris Johnson is an opponent of the 'nanny state' who will give the courts the ability to jail anyone who reveals the abuse of state power. Judge him by the standards that are meant to have guided his life, and you find that Boris Johnson is a monumental fraud. Yet no one contemplating the autocratic control his government is awarding itself has said that his transformation from celebrity journalist into secret policeman needs explaining. The one principle even his sternest critic would expect him to defend was a free press. Yet there he is threatening to censor and imprison like a part-time Putin."
The Times [£] in leader: "The home secretary wants to remove the public interest defence that protects whistleblowers and journalists from prosecution for handling leaked official material. Such 'damaging unauthorised disclosures' could cover anything from palace whispers to army equipment failures and the leaked footage of Matt Hancock breaking social distancing rules while conducting a workplace affair. Embarrassing is not the same as damaging. The need to balance national security with democratic freedoms is obvious, especially when western interests are under threat from hostile cyber- actors. Yet the Home Office undermines its own security arguments by proposing to do away with the obligation to prove the national interest was damaged by the leak. Instead, the whistleblower could be prosecuted simply for leaking."
Alan Rusbridger in the Mail on Sunday: "The Prime Minister is, famously, not a details man. But I suggest he asks an official to take a close look at the menacing threat to free speech that Ms Patel is proposing and stops them before this country's jails start filling up with editors, sources and journalists who still care about the value of our free institutions."
Boris Johnson interviewed by Nick Ferrari on LBC, as reported by Press Gazette: “We don’t – I don’t – want to have a world in which people are prosecuted for doing what they think is their public duty and… in the public interest. I’m full of admiration for the way journalists generally conduct themselves. Whatever this thing is, I don’t for one minute think it is going to interrupt the normal process.”
Sir Geoff Mulgan on his blog: "The most powerful clique in the UK at the moment are a group that are linked to the Spectator magazine. They congregate around the Spectator, and the Telegraph, and live in a dense web of networks, friendships, affairs and marriages...The Spectator is a literary culture where the most valued skill is being able to write a clever, witty essay. By contrast most of the fields where the UK is most successful now (science, some sports, business) are ones that demand deep knowledge, precision and care, rather than 'busking it'. Anyone who aspires to be world class has to be rigorous and expert.
"Michael Gove's much quoted dismissal of experts stuck because it reflected a deeper truth, the world view of a certain kind of journalist (both Gove and Johnson are journalists by profession, but journalists of commentary rather than news or investigation). Their metier is words rather than deeds and with words you can get by with wit and sheen, rather than depth and substance: the doers by contrast can't afford to ignore facts, details and expertise. So this stance often puts the Spectator people at odds with the professionals and experts - as will become painfully clear in any future COVID inquiry."
Andrew Marr, speaking at the Buxton International Festival, quoted by the Mail on Sunday: "Having a country where so many [former] journalists are in charge of the Government is dangerous because we are all encouraged to exaggerate."
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in a statement about the NSO Group spyware scandal: "The revelations about how this spyware is used inspire shock and revulsion, given the extent of the surveillance and targeting of journalists. No, NSO Group does not contribute to 'global security and stability', contrary to what the company claims. Pegasus is a vile and loathsome tool, invented by digital mercenaries and prized by 'press freedom predators' for use in persecuting journalists."
- Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has called on Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett to stop permitting the exportation of Pegasus.
Alan Rusbridger on being appointed the new editor of Prospect magazine: “Prospect is a cradle of ideas, good writing and thoughtful debate. Independent in its ownership and politics, it’s a meeting point where people can argue, agree—or simply agree to differ. It’s an ever-more important space in a polarised society which sometimes feels as if it’s lost the art of listening. As the pace of journalism speeds up—mirroring life in general—Prospect works to a different, more thoughtful, rhythm."
Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story by Julie K Brown, reviewed in the Sunday Times [£] by Christina Patterson: "Perversion of Justice reads like a thriller, but it is a searing indictment of a society in thrall to money and power. It is a gripping story, forensically researched by a courageous first-class journalist. Brown’s own hero is Bruce Springsteen, whose 'empathy for the struggles of the common man' is an inspiration. While writing her book, this cash-strapped single-mom daughter of a cash-strapped single mom often struggled to pay the rent. Journalism is struggling. Journalists are struggling. This blistering account of institutional corruption shows we have never needed it more."
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