Substantiating stories
- 30 Jan 07, 10:39 AM
There's always a certain nervousness when you hear that the competition has got a story. Just before six o'clock last Thursday evening I happened to be visiting the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh with some other Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ editors when I got word that Tom Bradby had a cash for honours exclusive on the ITV News at 1830.
Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Scotland's political editor, Brian Taylor - our guide for the day - showed his usual resourcefulness by piloting us into the members' bar, and getting the TV switched over to ITV (apparently MSPs generally prefer the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ!).
A group of us gathered round the screen. Bradby had to compete with a nearby piper tuning up for a Burns Supper, but we managed to hear the gist of his - that there was, he claimed, a second computer system in Downing Street, from which important e-mails appeared to have been deleted.
This sounded strong in the headline, but it turned out there wasn't much more in the piece beyond those two lines. And his story included Downing Street's absolute denial that this was true.
Our political correspondents back at Westminster checked it out, but couldn't stand up the story for themselves. So we reported it through the evening on our various programmes as Downing Street denying a report that... etc etc.
This caused the Daily Mail at the weekend to launch an for "burying" the cash for honours story.
Sorry chaps but that's just nonsense.
This was a story on ITV News and in the Daily Mail. The rest of the newspapers reported it as we did - someone else's journalism that couldn't be verified independently, and that had been denied.
We're as keen on good stories as anyone else. As the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ's deputy director general, Mark Byford, says in : "We want to break stories of significance and inform our audiences of new lines and developments. What matters is whether the stories stand up and can be substantiated." This one didn't and couldn't.
It's perhaps worth reminding people of a couple of other stories on the cash for inquiries inquiry where we were ahead. Allegations of offers of "a k or a p" (knighthood or peerage) which formed part of Bradby's story were originally a Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ scoop and lead story on the Ten O'Clock News before Christmas.
And more recently, the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ was first to break news of the arrest of Downing Street aide, Ruth Turner, the most significant (and substantiated) development in the cash for honours inquiry since Christmas.
We're as keen to broadcast an important story as any other broadcaster or paper - but only if we're happy it's true.
Gary Smith is editor, political news
