SALES, IRONIES AND WAR CRIMES
The press: Paul Johnson
looks at the struggle among the Sunday qualities
EASILY the most fascinating aspect of the national newspaper scene at present is the circulation war among the Sunday heavies. This is a vulnerable and contracting mar- ket, partly because the Saturday editions of the quality dailies are beginning to acquire the characteristics of Sundays — multiple sections crammed with features, colour mags and so forth. The ABC figures for January show that the Observer sold only an average of 703,785 copies during the month, down 57,314 (7.5 per cent) on January last year. The Sunday Telegraph, which is 15p cheaper but has no proper colour magazine, averaged 664,739 copies in January, down 72,991 or nearly ten per cent. True the Sunday Times, with its immense resources, had a January 1989 figure of 1,348,220, up 46,084. But, taking the January figures as a whole, the sector has still lost nearly 85,000 on the year.
This is one reason, no doubt, why the projected Sunday Correspondent has been unable to raise all its £16.5 million launch- money and has postponed its appearance from spring till autumn. The disastrous News on Sunday, it will be recalled, only got its final million or two by last-minute arm-twisting of union and Labour- controlled local authority funds, all of which lost every penny. That option is not open to the Correspondent, and its chances of appearing at all must now be regarded as slim. But interest in the Sunday quality market continues to be intense. One reason is the position of 'Tiny' Rowland. His battle with the Al-Fayed brothers over Harrods has become increasingly personal. Last year he circulated an extraordinary book about them, The Hero from Zero, which I read with great amusement and, to quote Horatio, 'do in part believe it'.
Although the Observer is believed to be on the market, the figures quoted as a possible sale-price are not realistic. Tiny's Lonrho has just reported excell- ent profits and beaten off a take-over challenge from the Australian beer-tycoon, Alan Bond, so the scourge of the Al- Fayeds does not need cash. One asking price I have heard is £300 million. A would-be purchaser told me last autumn he could raise £200 million to buy it but did not think the paper was worth it. Another possible buyer, Andreas Whittam-Smith of the Independent, says £100 million is 'total- ly unreasonable'. But the experience of the last year all over the world shows that predators will pay colossal prices for going concerns in the right circumstances, espe- cially when there is competition to buy. The Guardian, which has suffered severely from the Independent's rise and needs some kind of coup to boost its sagging morale, would dearly like the Observer (which it already prints under contract) to create a seven-day operation. But then so would the Independent. It averaged a monthly sale of just under 400,000 in January (up 32,000 on last year) and is expected to make handsome profits in 1989. (Whittam-Smith, who mortgaged his house to launch the paper, is already a multi-millionaire, a gratifying example of courage rewarded.) It would have no difficulty in raising impressive sums for a battle. So Tiny, when he chooses to sell, will be sitting pretty.
Not so the Observer, alas, for uncertain- ty about its future is bound to affect morale, already pretty low. It is not a good paper at present and shows the infallible signs of an institution in decline: an in- crease of termite-like activity by the Left. But then the Sunday Times, despite its enormous financial and commercial power and highly professional salesmanship, is also beginning to flag editorially. Nor is this surprising. Its editor, Andrew Neil, is also running Rupert Murdoch's Sky opera- tion, one of the biggest, most daring and 'Let's play health inspectors.' time-consuming ventures in the history of mass-communications. I wish Sky well and believe not only that it will eventually succeed but will raise the standards, as well as increase the choice, of British broadcast- ing. But it is absurd to think that Neil can run it, albeit I suppose on a temporary basis, and the Sunday Times as well, without the paper suffering. Indeed it has suddenly begun to look inchoate, just a vast number of column-inches with copy poured into them like concrete.
Now here we come to the cruel commer- cial ironies of newspaper publishing. With both the Observer and the Sunday Times looking rudderless, the Sunday Telegraph ought to be steaming ahead. There is certainly no lack of effort on the part of its crew. It is one of the few papers at present which has a true team or family spirit, due in large part to the affection in which its editor, Peregrine Worsthorne, is held by his staff. There is much less of the jealous compartmentalisation which is so charac- teristic of nationals, and more exchange of ideas. For instance, its brilliant scoop about the activities of Lieutenant- Commander Miers off Crete in 1941 was the inspiration of its literary editor, Der- went May, who spotted the significant passage in Ludovic Kennedy's memoirs; as a result the news-desk got working on the story. There are not many literary editors who give a thought to the paper's news- pages, and it is typical of the Sunday Telegraph spirit. Not, I hasten to add, that I believe for one minute that Anthony Miers was a war-criminal. He was a fighting officer, something in short supply during those dark days during the Crete debacle. The confusion, cowardice and lack of the will to win, or even to resist fiercely, among the British forces has been unforgettably de- scribed in the memorandum Evelyn Waugh wrote at the time, later used to create the Cretan section in his Officers and Gentlemen. Wars are won not by playing public school games but by des- troying the enemy's forces, chiefly by killing them. We could have fought an honourable, Observer-Guardian-style war with the Ludovic Kennedys in charge, but we would have lost it and Britain would have been enslaved. Fortunately, there were enough Churchills and Miers around to keep us in the fight. Miers could not take the Germans prisoner on board his sub, and if he had left them to paddle ashore they would immediately have gone back into the German forces which were slaughtering our expedition. So, whether or not they were armed, or he believed they were armed, he was right to kill them• However, whatever you think of his deci- sion, the issues raised are compelling and this was one of the best Sunday news- stories for some time. Sad that the paper which continually produces such stimulat- ing reading should be trailing its lacklustre competitors in sales.
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