Power and the media

David Hencke, Tony Gallagher, Peter Jukes and Glenda Cooper were the four panellists

Exaro debate raises the flaws in the relationship between government, the media and the police

On Wednesday night just off London’s Fleet Street, Exaro hosted their first debate and asked the question: “Did the media ever hold power to account?” Chaired by the investigate news source’s editor-in-chief Mark Watts and featuring a panel that numbered the academic and former Evening Standard features editor Glenda Cooper, The Sun’s editor-in-chief Tony Gallagher, the freelance lobby journalist and former Guardian Westminster correspondent David Hencke and the screenwriter, author and crusading journalist Peter Jukes, this was an event that – like the publication that hosted it – dared to delve into questions that other parts of the media would rather avoid.

At a time when there are more PR practitioners than journalists and Greenpeace are paying more than The Guardian to recruit members of the press to their causes according to Cooper, the balance of power in the relationship between the media and government (and the police, as Jukes rightly added) has changed. This shift, the panel felt, has not necessarily been for the better but what shone through, is that the mainstream media has somewhat been usurped by social media also.  (more...)

Power and the media

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Thanks to the great #Exarodebate panel last night. We are working on video of event. pic.twitter.com/N3snrSzWJ2

— ExaroNews (@ExaroNews) September 24, 2015