BRITAIN PROPOSES FINING NEWSPAPERS TO PROTECT PRIVACY

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 15, 1993                   TAG: 9301150016
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO  
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LONDON                                LENGTH: Medium
BRITAIN PROPOSES FINING NEWSPAPERS TO PROTECT PRIVACY
With yet another circus of royal revelation and innuendo setting a noisy background, the government on Thursday proposed heavy fines to restrain newspapers from snooping into private lives.
Some of the most titillating recent press reports about the royal family have resulted from taped telephone conversations and photographs that would be outlawed by the new legislation.
The new legislation would ban photography or sound recording on private property without an individual's consent, and would outlaw the bugging of conversations on private property, the national heritage secretary, Peter Brooke, told the House of Commons.
But the law would apply only to actions taken "with a view to publication" - in effect, to journalists only.
Brooke said the proposed laws were intended "to make sure that the home of everyone is in fact their castle, in which they can be secure and that they should not be interfered with."
Newspapers strongly protested the proposals, which were recommended by Sir David Calcutt, a lawyer appointed to review the performance of the industry's Press Complaints Commission.
"We will fight vigorously any attempt by the government to introduce criminal laws which would apply solely to journalists, and any further moves to restrict open justice," said Dugal Nisbet-Smith, director of The Newspaper Society, which represents 1,300 newspapers.
Calcutt proposed that the new laws be enforced by maximum fines equivalent to 1 percent of a publication's net annual revenue, or a maximum of $7,700 for individuals.
Brooke said the government wants to hear more debate on Calcutt's proposal that the commission be replaced with a government panel, headed by a judge, that would enforce a code of ethics.
The Sun, Britain's brash and biggest-selling newspaper, issued a statement Thursday saying the legislation "is about stopping us from printing the truth about the high and mighty."
Brooke, however, told the House of Commons that private individuals had written "in large numbers" to Calcutt to complain about treatment by the press.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB