FoI ‘not to give papers page leads’
By Andrew Grant-Adamson • May 18th, 2007 • Category: Journalism, PoliticsAs MPs again discuss exempting themselves from the Freedom of Information Act today, Lord Falconer, the Lord Chancellor, has once more been defending government plans for further restrictions.
It looked as if this plan to impose new limits on the number of requests that could be made and the cost of answering might have been kicked into the long grass with the dicision to have more consultation. But yesterday he told a Press Gazette media law conference at Reuters: “The public have a right to know information. But why should it be in the interests of the press to determine when and how they get it?… The purpose of the FoI Act is to give the public access to information. It is not to provide the media with page leads.”
With logic like that we can only hope Lord Falconer is a victim of the reshuffle when Gordon Brown actually gets his new job.
Andrew Grant-Adamson is Andrew Grant-Adamson is a journalist who now teaches a new generation of writers, subs and editors at the University of Westminster.
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This from the Bangkok Post:“I am not embarrassed. People made jokes at first but when they know I am a TITV reporter, they understand that we have been working unpaid,†said Thanyathorn Sarasit, 24… FoI ‘not to give papers page leads’ As MPs again discuss exempting themselves from the Freedom of Information Act today, Lord Falconer, the Lord Chancellor, has once more been defending government plans for further restrictions. It l…