11 SEPTEMBER 1964, Page 11

News Value

Some distinctly bitter complaints against the newspapers were voiced at this conference. Well, one should never expect politicians to feel that the press does full justice to them. The Liberals, however, have surely been immensely publicised since 1959. They may not have been flattered: they have certainly not been neglected. Yet the speaker who cried angrily, 'The way the Liberal revival is being treated in the press is a disgrace,' was rewarded with prolonged applause. Mr. Donald Wade, one of their MPs, quickly and temperately dissociated himself from the senti- ment. He belongs to the Liberal vintage which remembers when they were accorded almost no news value by the press. One of the party organ- isers had told me that the real reason for going ahead with their conference this year was the knowledge that it would be widely reported; and so it was.