NEWS EMBARGOES
Sta,—The letter from the Editor of The Birmingham Mail is a good example of the peevish suspicion into which some journalists can work themselves if a P.R.O. has displeased them. The refusal to credit the P.R.O.'s honesty of purpose, the sneer at his usefulness, the little puff for themselves—it is all drearily familiar. Mr. Whates affects to suppose that in releasing tfie B.M.A. plebiscite results when I did, I intended to favour the London "nationals." Had this been so, I could have sent the results round to the London papers by hand and saved myself a lot of trouble. Actually, as an old Manchester Guardian hand, whose sympathies are not confined to E.C.4 and W.C.1, I had the results posted in advance pre- cisely to secure that the bulk of the provincial Press got a fair deal. I say "the bulk," since in today's conditions of intense Press rivalry, no single release time can possibly please everybody. If news is released for the morning papers, the evening papers are displeased, and vice versa. All that the P.R.O. can do in these circumstances is to see that over a period everybody gets a fair share of whatever news is going.
The P.R.O. is a convenient whipping horse, but Mr. Whates is really criticising not me, but the conditions of his own trade. The Press often complains that it is so rushed that there is no time for adequate con- sideration of important material. Suppose, then, that a P.R.O. has some important and complicated news to publish, at what point in time should he issue it so that every newspaper will have an equal chance and no news- paper will be able to steal a march on its fellows ? As Mr. Whates knows perfectly well, there is no agreed answer to this question. There is no corporate body in existence which can supply an answer. When, however, the P.R.O. goes ahead on his own interpretation of "the greatest good of the greatest number," he is met with mean little charges of favouritism.—
Public Relations Officer, British Medical Association. Tavistock Square, W.C. r.
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