Journalism must transcend narrow nationalism

The Daily Mail: delivering the narrow, UK-centric journalism Bill Emmott is complaining about?

Journalists have a responsibility to apply facts and analysis to the more lurid responses of politicians to current crises.

Just in case you missed it, your attention should be drawn to an interesting and rather prescient open letter written by Bill Emmott, the former editor-in-chief of The Economist, addressed to the journalists and editors of Europe, and those in the UK in particular.

His question is this: At a time when the European Union, indeed the very idea of Europe as an entity, is facing crises of economics, public finances, migration, refugee flows and security are journalists doing a good job of analysing such cross-border, cross-cultural phenomena?

Or are they viewing such European-wide, even international issues, through the prism of national interest?

For Bill Emmott, and indeed anyone else who pauses to think about the question for a moment, the answer is clear.

His core case is contained in a single, rather long paragraph in the letter and it should be repeated in full.

“Too often, today’s European media – and the British are the worst culprit, but not the only ones – have been pandering to narrow, national interests and prejudices, and failed to explain the true nature of what has been going on,” Emmott argues.

“Worse still, some of the media – and here the British are true pioneers – have been conniving in the efforts of nationalists and anti-Europeans to close down the debate, to muzzle honest reporting by discrediting inconvenient views, and thereby choking off that most European, and quintessentially British, value of freedom of information and expression.”
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His main preoccupation is trying to ensure that when the debate about the UK’s place in the EU – or not – gets under way it is properly and fairly debated in the media rather than through knee-jerk reactions motivated by prejudice.

The pro-European Emmott – though not uncritical – was obviously also inspired by the mauling his film, The Great European Disaster Movie, received in some quarters.

His appeals on how the pressing issue of how the migrant and refugee crisis is being reported is particularly pertinent this week as the issue burst into life at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester.

All is not gloom and ignorance.

The Daily Mail’s reaction to the inflammatory speech by Home Secretary Mrs Theresa May when she accused immigrants of stealing jobs, making Britons poorer and basically ruining the country was all too predictable.

“Migrants: Woman With Guts To Tell The Truth” the Daily Mail headline read although there was an acknowledgement that there could be “a backlash” from big business and the Left.

Inside Peter Oborne went that little bit further by praising her for standing up for “ordinary people” and suggesting that she could even lead the “No to the EU” campaign.

It sounds like the sort of narrow UK-centric journalism that Emmott is complaining about.

But then comes the surprise and in the newspaper nicknamed The Torygraph – the Daily Telegraph.

In a piece by James Kirkup Theresa May is denounced over an immigration speech that was dangerous, factually wrong and a cynical ploy to boost her chances of becoming the next Conservative leader.

“We know that for people in low-paid jobs, wages are forced down even further while some people are forced out of work altogether,” raged Mrs May.

As the Daily Telegraph pointed out there is an answer to this in a detailed study carried out by – the Home Office itself.

The study noted there was relatively little evidence that migration caused statistically significant displacement of UK natives from the labour market in periods when the economy is strong – as it is now.

In addition, the Treasury, occupied by another Conservative potential leader in George Osborne, notes that immigration means growth is .25 percentage points higher than it otherwise would have been. In turn the OECD believes that the UK is richer and its public services are more sustainable as a result of migration.

There are many sectors, which would be virtually unsustainable without migrant labour, sectors such as vegetable and fruit farming in East Anglia and, increasingly, elderly care and hospitality throughout the country.

Simon Walker, director-general of the Institute of Directors, unsurprisingly a supporter of immigration on behalf of his members, likes to talk about how fresh sandwiches get made for a well-known chain.

Most of the work gets done between 2am and 6am and guess what? Not too many native Brits volunteer for the work and when they do they tend to come for a shift or two but often fail to turn up for many more.

The IoD director-general believes that the anti-migrant rhetoric and visa difficulties, even before the latest efforts of the Home Secretary, is already having the unfortunate effect of reducing the number of Indian students coming here to study.

At least as a result of some of the analysis carried by the Daily Telegraph it is possible to predict that Theresa May, while pleasing conference delegates and the Daily Mail, may have overplayed her hand by deploying the immigration card so crudely.

Bill Emmott is right. Editors and journalists have a responsibility to apply facts and analysis to the more lurid and simplistic responses of politicians to current crises and to do so from a perspective that transcends narrow nationalism.

So many problems actually become more understandable when the gaze is lifted beyond parochialism.

Enders Analysis has recently had a look at the situation of some of the world’s leading public service broadcasters, including the BBC.

The more international perspective is both enlightening and alarming.

The BBC in its present shape and function is in considerable peril at the hands of a centre-right Parliamentary majority, and in Culture Secretary John Whittingdale, a free-market zealot.

Two Commonwealth broadcasters loosely modelled on the BBC – the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation – are facing similar problems with severe budget cuts and equally severe job losses on the way.

Both receive their main budgets in the form of annual allocations from their governments.

Guess what – both countries have recently elected centre-right governments.

As Enders Analysis notes the budget cuts have been imposed by governments “without public or political debate and in spite of strong audience support.”

Yet again what is happening in Canada and Australia is a clear warning to what will happen in the UK unless UK audiences learn the lesson from abroad and complain in time.