Privacy case

Investigative journalism will go on

Published:

LET’S be quite clear about it: the adjudication yesterday in the Max Mosley privacy case against the News of the World was not a blow to investigative journalism. It did not, as the newspaper’s editor claimed, show that legitimate scrutiny of the wrongdoings of the great and good was being “strangled by stealth”. Britain’s press is no less free today than it was as a result of the decision to award Mr Mosley £60,000 for a breach of his privacy.

The News of the World is one of the great success stories of British journalism. It has exposed countless crooks, tracked down fraudsters and lifted the lid on corruption in high places. It has become by far Britain’s best-selling Sunday newspaper as a result. It has also made some incredible howlers, and its expose of motor sport boss Max Mosley was one of them.

Mr Mosley, although one of the leading figures in motor racing, was hardly a household name until the News of the World secretly filmed him taking part in a sadomasochism session with five prostitutes, acting out a German prison camp theme. An incredibly sordid little episode in the eyes of many, but carried out in private among willing adult participants.

The newspaper sought to justify exposing this behaviour by claiming that there was a Nazi theme, at a stroke linking Mr Mosley with his late father, the renowned fascist Sir Oswald Mosley. When it failed to prove that in court, it argued that the level of punishment meted out by the “prison guards” was so severe that it had, in fact, exposed the commission of a criminal offence. The defence was never going to succeed, and the judge’s finding in Mr Mosley’s favour is a setback only for the News of the World, not for legitimate investigative journalism.