The interim report from the Scottish Affairs Select Committee says it will carry out further consultation on whether the blacklisting continues, the punishment for those involved and the compensation for those affected.
The committee has been taking evidence since last year on the scandal which was exposed when the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) raided The Consulting Association (TCA) in 2009. It unearthed a database of more than 3,200 names compiled on behalf of more than 44 firms used to weed out potential employees.
The MPs’ report says: “By the end of TCA’s life it certainly was illegal and all those involved should have know that. We consider it unethical, and to be condemned. We do not accept the argument made in self justification that blacklisting did not occur because people were not automatically excluded from employment. This is evasive wordplay.”
Building firms Sir Robert McAlpine Ltd, Balfour Beatty and Skanska all gave evidence to the committee along with Ian Kerr who ran the Consulting Association. He died only weeks after his appearance where he confirmed that McAlpine’s had given £10,000 to help start the operation and been closely involved throughout; including paying his £5,000 fine when he was convicted of data protection offences.
Although the ICO was initially praised for its groundbreaking investigation there is criticism from MPs for its actions. In particular its decision to seize only 5%-10% of all the material in TCA offices and a perceived lack of effort in contacting people on the blacklist.
“We find the ICO’s justification for leaving behind the vast majority of documents at TCA’s office unconvincing,” the report says. “We accept that the ICO was concerned that the warrant which it had obtained was limited in scope, but we regret that more documents were not seized. Even if the Consulting Association is now defunct, there remains the possibility that its activities could have been more widespread than has so far come to light. A greater degree of curiosity on the ICO’s part might have demonstrated this one way or the other.”
A spokesman for the Blacklist Support Group said: “The so-called captains of industry are in complete denial. Even with mountains of evidence they refuse to admit their guilt. They are like the News International at the beginning of the phone hacking scandal.
“Blacklisted workers applaud the Select Committee interim report but just like phone hacking, the full story of the human rights abuse by big business and undoubted police collusion will only be exposed in a full Leverson-style pubic inquiry.
“Anyone who bothers to look knows that blacklisting still continues today: on Crossrail the evidence is blatant.
“So long as blacklisted workers are denied jobs to support our families the weasel words of the multi-nationals are worthless. The interim report is a big step forward but the campaign for justice continues.”
The report from MPs casts doubt on claims by Skanska that its relationship with the Consulting Association was down to one individual, Stephen Quant, who has now left the company.
“It seems implausible that no-one else in the company had the slightest inkling that potential employees or subcontractors were being systematically checked against a database,” the report says.
Meanwhile it says that it believes that Balfour Beatty “regrets being caught, we were less convinced that management regretted its involvement with TCA”.
It asks the construction firm for a copy an internal review it carried out after the ICO raid which it has so far not disclosed.
As for Cullum McAlpine, the company director who gave evidence on his role with the Association, MPs say they are “not persuaded” by his description of that role being “hands-off”.
Steve Murphy, general secretary of the building union UCATT, said: “Every time there has been an evidence session we have learned more about the blacklisting scandal. A further call for evidence and fresh evidence sessions are to be warmly welcomed. The final Scottish Affairs Committee report should act as an essential building block for a full public inquiry into the blacklisting scandal.”
The Campaign Against the Arms Trade, Ethical Consumer magazine and Reclaim the Streets were among the perfectly legal groups illegally targeted by an offshoot of the notorious Economic League, MPs have been told.
Jack Winder spent 30 years with the League – which kept files on people it considered subversives on behalf of corporations. He rose to become its director of research. He told MPs on the Scottish Affairs Select Committee that after the League folded he and a colleague, Stan Hardy, set up Caprim “to warn companies about threats to their well-being”.
He said clients did not include construction companies such as Sir Robert McAlpine, which gave Caprim
£10,000 as a “goodwill” donation, with the proviso that it kept clear of the work of the Consulting Association.
The Association was set up in 1993 by another former League official, Ian Kerr, to provide intelligence on individuals specifically for building firms. It was a raid on the Association by the Information Commissioner in 2009 which exposed the secret blacklisting operation and led to the MPs’ investigation. The committee had previously been told that McAlpine was instrumental in setting up the
Consulting Association. It paid the League £10,000 for its Services Group files, on individuals and organisations, set up for the construction industry after the building workers’ strike of 1972 to target those involved.
While Mr Kerr was collating information for dozens of construction companies, Mr Winder and Mr Hardy
were touting their advice to other sectors.
He said: “During the 1990s, the sorts of things which exercised our minds were campaigns against
multinational companies. You had the Transnational Information Exchange in Amsterdam, which had offshoots in this country, Multinational Monitor based in Washington. You had campaigns against the City of London culminating in three consecutive years of riots run by an outfit called Reclaim
The Streets. These were anarchists.
"We made it our business to find out what was going on and warn the companies.
“You had the whole ethical industry. People who set themselves up as arbiters about what was ethical.
They advised investors and how shareholders should vote.”
Mr Winder said they targeted campaigners against the defence, pharmaceutical and agrochemical
industries. He named GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Rhone-Poulenc, Zeneca, Monsanto, Rio Tinto, J P Morgan and Morgan Stanley as among Caprim’s clients.
He denied any links with the security services though he admitted that he regularly met Special Branch
officers while with the League.
Over 15 years, Caprim’s turnover totalled £1 million, according to Jack Winder, but folded in 2008 because it lost clients and he was looking to retire.
Ian Kerr died at the end of last year.
Filed for Tribune Feb 6, 2013
The head of news for the BBC in Bristol, Neil Bennett, came to UWE to talk to MA journalism students about his work.
And while there talked about the use by BBC Points West of a drone to gather aerial images - and the fact this is likely to get more common among media companies.
The drone his team used was hired and operated by Clive Bailey who runs Bailey Balloons as he has a licence to fly them over built-up areas.
Apologies for the sound quality (you might need headphones to hear Neil's talk). The drone stuff really kicks in about two minutes in.
Union blacklister Ian Kerr made his first public appearence since he was in the dock in 2010 for breaching data protection laws.
The occasion was a hearing of the Scottish Affairs Select Committee which is investigating blacklisting. A link to Parliament TV which carried the hearing is below.
I reported on the remarkable four-hour session for The Independent and for Union News. A further report is expected in Private Eye. Meanwhile the Financial Times, Observer, Daily Mirror, Morning Star and (comprehensively) Socialist Worker all carried reports (links below).
And hello to Alan the Mirror snapper who I stood with for nearly two hours in the rain outside Parliament so I could identify Kerr for him and ensure the public could put a face to the man who worked in the shadows.
Prf Matt Waite heads up the University of Nebraska's Drone Journalism Lab which has received $50,000 from the Knight Foundation to research the ethics and uses of UAVs by the media.
You can see the latest experiments from his lab in the clip below. As opposed to Lewis Whyld's UAV, which covered flooded areas in the UK (outlined in my previous post), Waite's team has been looking at droughts in America. Below the clip Prof Waite explains to me in detail how he sees the media using UAVs in the years to come.
Q: What do you hope/plan to have produced for the Knight Foundation come the end of your grant?
A: Several things. First, we want to build, fly and test some UAVs. Just getting some experience and writing about it openly will be very beneficial for journalists trying to evaluate this idea. Right now, I think we've all seen too many movies and have some wild eyed ideas of what's possible. Putting some reality into the discussion will be step one. Second, we're going to write about ethical issues involved, both from a historical perspective and from an in-the-field experience perspective. We think that by using them, we'll think of new questions to ask. Third, we hope to have a legal, ethical and safety framework for journalists who want to use UAVs to do journalism. We want to give journalists tools to make decisions about when and how - and if at all - to use UAVs.
Q: Apart from American news organisations, where else do you see drone journalism advancing quickest? It seems that in some cases NGOs/activists are taking up the possibilities quicker than news outlets.
A: I fully expect others to take it up faster than newsrooms do. News organizations, if I'm being nice, tend to be rather deliberative with these kinds of things. There are laws and rules in place that give business managers and corporate legal counsels pause when it comes to using UAVs — at least currently — so I think activists with less concern about the feelings of authorities will move much quicker than news organizations. But I think you're going the right direction with NGOs. I'd throw in democracy activists and rebel movements too. If you're a Syrian rebel, and you need the world to sympathize with your cause, getting pictures and video and news out of there is important. It's a matter of time before an NGO uses a UAV to photograph human rights abuses and changes the world's opinion about a place.
Q: Would it be accurate to say that drone journalism is a situation where legal (aviation and privacy) codes are struggling to keep pace with corporate/individual innovation?
A: There's no doubt that's the situation. Think about it. Right now, you can go to any mall and buy a quad-copter with a high definition camera mounted on the front of it that only requires an iPhone or Android phone to fly, all for $350. That video can be recorded right on the device and uploaded to the internet in minutes. There are laws that could be brought to bear, but those laws never considered someone with a flying toy capable of taking broadcast quality video.
Q: Setting aside aviation rules, what is the biggest barrier to a freelance photographer/broadcaster aiming to use a drone today?
A: Cost and complexity would be easy answers, but I think the key one people aren't thinking about because we don't have a lot of experience with it is safety. I think people have this idea — based on what we see of military drones in war zones flying for long periods of time seemingly without error — that these things are reliable and safe. They're getting more reliable and they're getting safer, but there's still a substantial risk of a crash every time they take off. If you're a freelance photojournalist, I'm going to go out on a limb and guess you don't have the insurance needed when your photo drone loses an engine and crashes on the head of a protester. A significant amount of research needs to be done on when, where and how these things can be used safely.
Q: In ten years time how would you expect to see drone journalism being used?
A: In 10 years, I think drones for journalism will be boring. I think they'll be like smartphones. They're another tool in the kit. Of course we use UAVs to cover a wildfire. Why wouldn't we? We've been doing it for years. That kind of thinking. I'm really excited about drones for journalism, I think they'll be a very useful tool for a lot of journalists in the very near future, but I think they're just another tool. Drones will not be writing stories. Drones will not find the humanity in a story. Drones will be a tool for journalists to do what they do best: journalism. And that's all that they are. In 10 years, we'll look back at all this fuss about drones and wonder why we were so worked up.
The next few years are likely to see a new tool added the journalist's armoury - unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Drone journalism already has its own academic department and on Monday a workshop takes place in Oxford organised by the Reuter's Institute for the Study of Journalism. In the next edition of the NUJ magazine The Journalist I'll be looking in detail on how the media plans to use UAVs for news gathering.
For the article I interviewed Lewis Whyld, a photographer with the Press Association, who has built his own UAV. He used it this year to take pictures of flooding. In the full interview below Lewis explains more about how he plans to use his flying camera.
Summer flooding filmed with my UAV from Lewis Whyld on Vimeo
“I've been developing the systems in private for years because I realised the potential for news-gathering and journalism, but people generally thought it was a crazy idea so I kept it quiet.
“I've built some from scratch and some modified from existing airframes. It has taken a few years of experimenting, designing and flying to get a good understanding of which works best for the wide variety of conditions you might find on a story.
“Beyond the airframe you need to design or find a powertrain that will give you the necessary lift. Beyond the powertrain are the electronics, sensors, gyro stabilisers and satellite connections that give you altitude, groundspeed, airspeed, navigational tools, flight stabilisation and autopilot/waypoint functions.
“You will need a radio link from the ground to the UAV for control, which along with the flight time helps determine your range. I also add a live video-link to the ground so I can fly from the point of view of the UAV. To do this you will have to build your own antennas for the frequencies you have selected.
“I record the 'live' view on the ground using a groundstation that I built from scratch that can display all of the in-flight data received from the UAV, including battery voltages, RSSI (signal strength indicator) and GPS position together with the live video feed and altitude, speed etc.
“Placing the items in the UAV requires thought as the centre of gravity (COG) needs to be precise. Different centres result in different flying characteristics, and thus it may be necessary to change the COG depending on the conditions of the story you are covering.
“Using a UAV to film the floods was more of an experiment. It is rare to see UAV footage in difficult weather conditions. As a result I can transfer the techniques to my newer, more stable airframes.
“The need in this country is not as great as it is elsewhere - both in terms of commercial and journalistic uses. My UAVs are primarily designed for use in other countries. I plan on invading the privacy of dictators, despots and human rights abusers who massacre civilians with impunity. Every generation of journalists has a responsibility to use the tools available to them in order to discover and report the truth.
“My UAVs and for use in places where people are being shot in their back-gardens rather than sunbathing. It's as simple as that.”
From a photographic essay on the Dale Farm travellers to a film uncovering atrocities in Sri Lanka, the 21st Amnesty International UK media awards suggest that human rights reporting is in good health.
But there is a warning from award winners that not enough is being done to foster such reporting.
Vanessa Baird, co-editor of the New Internationalist, was a winner in the consumer magazine category for an article looking at people fighting back against mining exploitation in Peru.
“I think the media would do better at covering human rights if it carried a greater diversity of news, from different parts of the world and on different aspects of human rights,” she says. “Much of the time the various outlets are telling pretty much the same stories - and actually, not very many of them. As a result, we are getting a shockingly narrow and repetitive slice of the world's news from the mainstream media.”
You can read the rest of the article here. There is a longer interview with Vanessa Baird below.
The piece stemmed from the dissertation I did for my Journalism MA which looked at ten years of the Amnesty awards to see who won, what kind of abuses were covered and which countries featured. The germ of the idea came from reading Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine and in particular the passages on how human rights organisations dealt with abuses in Argentina in the 1970s. If you want to get academic on this then you can read When do Opportunities become Trade-offs for Social Movement Organizations? Assessing Media Impact in the Global Human Rights Movement by Kathleen R Rodgers or Transnational Information Politics: NGO Human Rights Reporting by Ron, J, Ramos, H and Rodgers, K.You can read the full dissertation here and you see a spreadsheet on the results from 2002-2012 broken down by type here.
Let's get it up front first; this is NOT an attack on Amnesty International or on the undoubted quality of those shortlisted. However I think there is a legitimate debate to be had about how the media report human rights stories. Since the Amnesty awards are one of the main ways excellence in this area is rewarded it is fair to consider what constitutes the best in such reporting. What does the awards list say about what the media think of good human rights reporting? What is Amnesty encouraging journalists to see as the best through these awards?
Looking at the last decade, the results showed that a relatively small group of outlets were consistently nominated (Guardian, Channel 4, BBC). They also showed that some parts of the globe appeared more popular than others. African countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo were visited regularly South America had largely disappeared. Unsurprisingly, where Western armies tread, human rights stories follow.
While there are 30 articles in the UN Declaration on Human Rights some breaches struggle to trouble the awards list. The right of workers to join a trade union is one. Indeed stories about exploitation often show individuals at the mercy of unfathomable forces, rather than fighting back. The awards seem to favour stories about the abuse involving women and children.
There is a lot in the dissertation (well, it's 14,000 words, what do you expect) and, as ever, more than I could have included in the Journalist article. However I thought it might be useful to put in the full response I got from the New Internationalist's Vanessa Baird because it raises a lot of interesting points. Vanessa picked up an Amnesty award for the magazine's Nature's Defenders edition.
Q: What made you want to cover this issue in particular - what made it stand
out?
A: The clash between multinational
corporations and indigenous people is being played out in many parts of the
world today.
But in Peru, it has been most intense and,
at times, violent. Peru's indigenous people are truly on the frontline. They
are up against multinational capital and extractive mining industries that are
depleting and poisoning the water on which they depend for survival, with
cyanide, mercury and other heavy metals. They are up against against big dam
hydroelectric projects to create electricity for Brazilian energy corporations
that will flood out and destroy the homes and livelihoods of thousands of
indigenous Amazonian people.
Occasionally, individual incidents hit the international news - like when more
than 30 people died in a fight between indigenous people and police at Bagua,in
the Peruvian jungle,in 2009.
But from local contacts on the ground I knew that these protests were happening
across the country, pretty much all the time, and that the human rights of
indigenous protesters and environmental activists were being abused on a daily
basis. More than 100 people had died in the last three years as a result of
such environmental conflicts and many more had prison sentences hanging over
them, simply for protesting.
When I got to Peru and observed some of these confrontations, I found that the
clash goes far beyond a tussle over territory or resources. It's a conflict
between two diametrically opposed views on how to treat the natural environment
and on how to live. On the one hand, the corporations exist to extract as much
as possible from it in order to maximize their profits. On the other hand, indigenous
communities view nature (or 'Pacha Mama' as they call it) as a common good.
They believe that you have to protect nature if you want it to protect you, and
that means not taking more from it than you need. They call this 'living well'.
They have the support of local environmental groups and scientific
organizations that see all too clearly the damage being done by the extractive
industries and see in the indigenous approach lessons we could all learn.
So this is a story about human rights but it's also about environmental rights
- and, today especially, the two are often indivisible.
Q: Your story raises an issue of concern - does the award help
highlight that? If so, how?
A: I think it gives extra media
attention to the way in which, for example, the Ashaninka people are, with some
success, resisting mega -dam projects and helps garner international support
for them.
The organisations that helped me - CARE in Peru and the Rainforest
Foundation in Britain – are well aware that adverse international publicity can
sometimes have a greater impact on governments and corporations than can be
achieved by local or national press. (Indeed, an international company that was
to build one of the dams - Odebrecht - actually pulled out because of adverse
publicity, saying it was doing so 'out of respect for local people'. The Canadian
miner, Bear Creek, saw its share price fall when its clash with local people
became international news.)
Q: Are there enough journalists doing human rights stories (and enough
places to publish/broadcast them)? Do these awards properly reflect media coverage of human rights? Where
could the media do better in covering human rights?
A: My experience as a co-editor of New Internationalist tells me that there are
plenty of journalists out there, wanting to write human rights stories. The
difficulty is finding enough media outlets. And as times get tougher for
independent media the situation is likely get worse.
I think we are being let down badly by the major broadcast media,
including the BBC, which over the years have been dis-investing in serious
journalism and the more complex, slow-burning stories. I think the Amnesty
Awards had some very powerful winners this year and I felt humbled to be
included among them. Understandably, given world events, reports from the
Middle East and North Africa dominated the field.
But I do wonder what happens to news from other places, when all the
media decides to focus so heavily on one area?
I think the media would do
better at covering human rights if it carried a greater diversity of news, from
different parts of the world and on different aspects of human rights. So much
of the time the various outlets are telling pretty much the same stories - and
actually, not very many of them. As a result, we are getting a shockingly
narrow and repetitive slice of the world's news from the mainstream media.
I'd like to thank Vanessa, photographer Mary Turner, film maker Callum Macrea, Angus Stickler from the Bureau of Investigative of Journalism and Amnesty's Mike Blakemore for giving up their time to talk to me for The Journalist article. As ever, I could only use parts of their longer and well-considered opinions. The results, and any errors, are mine. The plaudits they received for their work are theirs and well deserved.
Union News has printed my interview with barrister David Renton who has a new book out looking at empoyment tribunals.
A new book by a leading employment barrister calls for debate in the trade union movement about the role of employment tribunals as government changes are expected to make it even tougher for workers to win cases.
David Renton, from Garden Court Chambers, predicts increased industrial action as an already flawed system provides even fewer workers with a place to settle grievances.
Renton was inspired to write Struck Out five years ago, following a speech by Gordon Brown where the then chancellor characterised the system as out of control. Renton says this “rank opportunism”, based on a false premise, has allowed the press to print a distorted picture ever since.
You can read the full story here.
And Dave Renton's blog Struck Out is well worth a read.
Tribune magazine has published my interview with Cambodian MP Mu Sochua
Tens of thousands of people in Cambodia have been forcibly evicted from their homes as powerful companies and individuals take advantage of land concessions.
Those grabbing the land are often linked to Cambodia’s ruling People’s Party, and are supported by a corrupt and ineffective policing and judicial system.
But Cambodians are not standing idly by. They are fighting back and often those leading the fightback are women.
Mu Sochua is a prominent Cambodian MP who has championed those evicted from their land – and faced threats and intimidation from the government in return. In 2009, she sued Prime Minster Hun Sen for defamation but lost. He counter-sued and won. As a result, Sochua lost her parliamentary immunity and was fined $4,000. The fine was eventually paid by her party. She now faces further legal action as a result of her activities to highlight the plight of the dispossessed.
Speaking on the phone from Cambodia, Sochua sounds upbeat despite an arduous day touring affected areas and then a four-hour drive back home.
You can read the rest of the article on the Tribune website.