The press
My anniversary
Patrick Marnham
This month marks my fifteenth anniversary in journalism and broadcasting, and during that time I must have worked either as a freelance or as an employee for about twenty persons describing themselves as Editors. They have almost without exception been men or women of quite outstanding intelligence and charm. However, they have sometimes indulged their little eccentricities.
One, a youngish man whose disposition was generally noticeable for its generosity, once employed me for three days and at the end of this period, which had been overflowing as I thought with high spirits and good fellowship, wrote to say that he had decided not to pay me a penny since, 'as far as I can see you do little except sit around and make trouble'. My reaction was the more baffled, since I have always supposed that 'sitting around and making trouble' was quite a good short definition of a journalist's task.
Another editor, handsome, erudite, selfassured, once sent the quietest man in the office home for the day on the grounds that be 'looked unwell'. This man, growing suddenly suspicious, returned in the afternoon to find a newcomer had been placed at his desk and authorised to take over his job. When he tottered into the editor's office to remonstrate he was immediately locked in the broom cupboard and the police were called to remove him on the grounds that he was drunk.
These reminiscences are not presented to give the impression that newspaper editors are unscrupulous, tyrannical, self-indulgent megalomaniacs — which could of course be quite wrong. Rather they are intended to make it clear that I am not in any sense 'against' trade unions. My own union is the National Union of Journalists, and since the editors of England include in their number several uncertified lunatics, the NUJ clearly has a function to protect its members from the dangers involved in dealing with them. And in recognition of this I have twice assisted in the formation of new union chapels.
Nor is my attitude to the union in any way coloured by the reception accorded to my only urgent appeal for its assistance. At the time I was being prosecuted forcriminal libel by a multi-millionaire, but on learning of this the man at the NUJ replied, 'Sorry, we can't get involved in libel actions.' All attempts to explain that this was not 'a libel action' but the first criminal libel prosecution of a journalist for fifty years evoked the same Neanderthal reply. Never mind. They are forgiven. (Slightly.) But when it comes to the NUJ's 'Magazine and Book Industrial Council Model Claim' one must react more firmly. This document, which is fifteen pages long, represents the best efforts of the union's finest minds. It is because they have to devote their time to such documents that union officials are unable to grasp the fine distinction between civil and criminal libel. The Model Claim is an ideal agreement between journalists and their employers, and is entirely concerned with conditions of work. It starts off by establishing that the FoC (or shop steward) and 'officers' shall carry out their union activities very largely at the employer's expense. Time spent on union business is paid for by the firm; the firm provides the FoC with a telephone, a telex, postage and photocopying; union meetings are held in office hours and union officials can attend conferences or trade union education courses on full pay. This seems to be current practice throughout industry. There are obvious practical and financial difficulties for the union in any other arrangement, but it also seems likely that employers are well aware of the tactical advantage which this apparent concession gives them.
Having established that union officials need not be fulfilling any function on behalf of their employers at any particular time the agreement turns to the burning question of how to treat journalists who have been convicted of a criminal offence. If they have been deprived of their liberty for less than six months, the job must be kept open for them. But if they are jailed for longer then they are merely entitled to take the first appropriate vacancy.
If, as might have happened in my own case, a journalist has been locked up in heroic defence of the great principle of press freedom, that would seem to me quite reasonable. But supposing she was jailed for life for mass murder after poisoning the office coffee supply? Is it entirely sensible, as Clause 6.8 lays down, that she should be reinstated as of right as soon as she 'declares her ability to return to work'?
This unreal -note grows in strength as the clauses mount up. Hours of work should be thirty-five per week, inclusive of mealtimes. There shall be six weeks' paid holiday a year, 'public holidays and the week between Christmas and New Year should be additional'. If a journalist falls sick on holiday she is awarded equivalent time off when she recovers. She shall get twenty-six weeks' paid maternity leave and her job shall be held open for forty weeks after that. Paternity leave shall be fully paid for thirteen weeks.
All journalists have the right to twenty days' leave per year on full pay for the care of sick relatives, and a further twenty days ditto in the event of a close relative dying (the 'grandmother's funeral trick' gone mad). There will be six weeks' extra full-paid sabbatical leave every three years, but this must not be used for journalistic work as it is 'intended for intellectual refreshment'. (One might have thought at this stage that any work undertaken would have been refreshing from its novelty value alone.) Finally — the Kids. Nursery facilities for the children of all employees shall be provided during working hours at the place of employment. They shall be up to local authority standard and one full-time qualified nurse will be provided for every five children. Naturally journalists will have free access throughout the working day to their children and to the nursery.
The only rational explanation for this list of demands must be that it is intended to close down magazine and publishing offices as places of employment altogether. This would be a defensible ambition from several points of view, but not I think from the NUJ's. Some of the people who drew up the Model Claim must also be celebrating their fifteenth anniversary. As they dedicated themselves to their high calling did they look ahead and suppose that in fifteen years this was how they would be passing the time; drawing up a list which resembles nothing so much as the lists they used to post to Santa fifteen years before?
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