IT is the People, however, the Sunday all-sorts, which is
engaging the attention of the Press Council at the moment. Copies of the Honours List were given to Lobby Correspon- dents on Friday on the understanding that nothing was to he published until Monday morning. They are a discreet body of men in whose keeping a secret from Downing Street would be safe until the deadline, though the heavens fell meanwhile. On Saturday the Press Association, which has a Lobby Correspon- dent, quite properly sent the list out for the benefit of provincial newspapers which have not, so that they might have ample time to prepare suitable tributes to local recipients of honours. And so it was, since the PA tape rains alike on the just and unjust, that the Sunday newspapers were exposed to tempta- tion. The People, ignoring the embargo, succumbed and pub- lished the list with a, bravura worthy of a genuine scoop. As soon as the first edition was off the machines and on all the rival editorial desks, the telephone at Downing Street was buzzing; but it says a lot for the other papers' sense of proportion that they did not decide to follow the People's lead and dishonour that entirely reasonable convention without which the relations between Downing Street and the press would tumble into unruly chaos. No official reprisals are to be taken against the People, but I shall be very surprised if the Press Council, when it meets on January 27, will not have something harsh to say. Whether or not that will worry the People is another matter. The Petrov scoop seems to have gone to its head. And no doubt it is encouraged in its brashness by the fact that there has not been a murmur out of any other newspaper since it did them all down so cheaply on Sunday morning.
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