back to article Blighty ranks 38th in World Press Freedom Index

The UK has ranked 38th in the 2016 World Press Freedom Index - a league table of "the degree of freedom available to journalists in 180 countries". Topping the Reporters Without Borders (aka Reporters sans frontières, or RSF) index is Finland, followed by The Netherlands, Norway, Denmark and New Zealand. China, Syria, …

  1. graeme leggett Silver badge

    There's a method certainly

    But I think they could have made how they calculate the scores a little clearer. A worked example would be nice.

    So would seeing how they aggregate scores from questionnaires and how they reached the weightings for each item too.

  2. Tom Chiverton 1

    *China* is ahead

    FFS

    1. TimR

      Re: *China* is ahead

      "...followed by The Netherlands, Norway, Denmark and New Zealand. China, Syria, Turkmenistan, North Korea and Eritrea prop up the table."

      I missed the full stop after New Zealand on the first read as well....

      1. chivo243 Silver badge

        Re: *China* is ahead

        @TimR

        Me too. I went to the rsf site and looked just to be sure. Re-read the sentence, and there is a . stuck somewhere in there.

    2. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

      Re: *China* is ahead

      I'm surprised to see North Korea comes out ahead of Eritrea though. I'd have thought they'd be bottom of the pile - given there's not even the opportunity for journalists to print disobliging things about the government. And they'd much more likely be shot, than imprisoned too. If not them and their whole families being sent to the gulags.

      1. asdf

        Re: *China* is ahead

        As far as I know even North Korea doesn't conscript nearly everybody for life in the military (ie slavery) like Eritrea which is why they are bleeding refugees. NK probably comes close though.

  3. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    "the police have since 1984 been able to . . ."

    If that was in a work of fiction, critics and public alike would pan it for lazy writing.

    But it's just reality.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not surprised

    When they are not allowed to mention olive oil wrestling and threesomes.

    At least Irish press can mention it.

    Note : Do not care about the threesome, but do care about press gagging.

    1. Rich 11

      Re: Not surprised

      but do care about press gagging

      Hey, enough! Whatever goes on between consenting journalists behind closed newsroom doors is entirely their own business.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: threesomes

      Note : Do not care about the threesome, but do care about press gagging.

      OK, can someone explain why this is different to "revenge porn" ?

      What's the difference between "I've got some photos on my ex I'd like to post on some dodgy website" and "I've some some photos of some 'celebrity' I'd like to sell to which ever news paper will give me the most dosh"

      Am I missing something?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: threesomes

        Of course if they get further down the list the press will have to start reporting they are number one on the list.

    3. Adam 52 Silver badge

      Re: Not surprised

      "Do not care about the threesome, but do care about press gagging"

      So we should have a free and unrestricted press? Free to publish whatever they want about anyone? That implies no right to privacy at all.

      I've seen ordinary people's lives destroyed by News Corp. It isn't pretty.

      1. MJI Silver badge

        Re: Not surprised

        gagging.

        Everywhere else in the world but England and Wales.

        I would also say that the deleted messages were safe as they did not mention any names.

        Hinted at, but no ID

        1. Adam 52 Silver badge

          Re: Not surprised

          "I would also say that the deleted messages were safe as they did not mention any names."

          Then you have no clue about contempt of court. The rules are very strict. There are conventions agreed by trained journalists to allow limited reporting without revealing identity, but they are horribly complicated and breach can, and does, result in convictions.

          1. Preston Munchensonton
            Megaphone

            Re: Not surprised

            "Free to publish whatever they want about anyone?"

            Actually, this is a perfectly fine state of affairs. Yes, it does mean that some people will get bad press. It also opens up journalists and publications to libel suits. So, any publication that wants to publish something has to make absolutely certain that they aren't being duped by their sources.

            Nothing that I've stated above differs from the current status quo. So exactly what about removing the various restrictions on speech would up end that? Nothing.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Not surprised

              The Injunction appears to be in place to protect their children from the knowledge of their parents' threesome arrangements (whereas everybody else already knows about it).

              God protect the children from the knowledge of (2^N -1) possible permutations where N = 3.

      2. frank ly

        Re: Not surprised

        I want to know more about olive oil wrestling. I have an unopen bottle of olive oil in my kitchen.......

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Terrorist attacks are the means, not the cause, by which press freedom has been curtailed.

  6. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Unhappy

    What a sorry, impoverished little island we have become.

    1. werdsmith Silver badge

      Since many years I have learned not to believe a single word that appears in the printed press.

      Freedom to print lies is what they actually want, the press in UK has repeatedly proven itself too irresponsible for freedom.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'm surprised we got 38th. Where are articles about TTIP in the main press? Where is any opposition to IPB in the main press? What purpose does the main press serve any more other than to push the agenda of business or politicians which are already aligned? Are the main press free to write real journalistic stories or are they controlled by their editors?

    All these rhetorical questions point to us not having a free press but more likely a bought one controlled by those that have money and power.

    There are few places left that expose the corrupt and that is the only time the main press report on it.

    1. caffeine addict

      This is about if they are free to investigate something if they choose to, not about if their corporate overlords allow them to.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      It's shocking how they never mention it

      http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-31631461 "TTIP: Transatlantic trade deal text leaked to BBC"

      http://beta.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-33422086 "TTIP talks: Transparency call for EU-US trade disputes"

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        @AC

        Really?

        http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-31631461 "Biased crap about a leak saying the NHS is safe"

        http://beta.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-33422086 "The EU is apparently arguing with itself to stop those pesky secret courts"

        Both the above were in response to other stories about TTIP, so they had no choice.

  8. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

    You cannot hope to bribe or twist

    (thank God!) the British journalist.

    But, seeing what the man will do

    unbribed, there’s no occasion to.

    Seems appropriate somehow.

    It's a hard survey to quantify. In some ways the UK has some of the most free press in the world. They're much less restrained by taste or social pressure than in many other countries. Our politicians get a lot shorter shrift from our press in general than do American ones, or most of the rest of Europe. So it's a bit more anarchic, and elements more likely to kick the establishment. We've also got a comparitively wide variety of viewpoints - even though there are two really big players in the Murdoch press/Sky and the BBC. On the other hand we've got tough libel laws, a new system of press regulation that's still only half completed, and some dodgy legislation like RIPA - which the police and government too often abuse. So it's a bit of a mixed bag.

    1. graeme leggett Silver badge

      Libel law changes

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Chiropractic_Association_v_Singh

      led to "new statutory defences of truth, honest opinion, and "publication on a matter of public interest" or privileged publications "

      and "requiring claimants to show actual or probable serious harm ", "setting limits on geographical relevance,"

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defamation_Act_2013

    2. Lars Silver badge
      Happy

      @ I ain't Spartacus

      Well said and reassuring, among the 28 EU countries 10 are still behind Blighty, those are Bulgaria 113, Romania 49, France 45, Greece 89, Hungary 67, Croatia 63, Poland 47, Italy 77, Slovenia 40, Malta 46.

  9. John 156
    FAIL

    To be taken with a pinch of salt - Objective it is not

    Russia 138th yet Russia tolerates virulent attacks on its President and the open advocacy of the removal of Putin and his replacement by a traitor who would ibe under the control of Western leaning 'oligarchs'.

    1. asdf

      Re: To be taken with a pinch of salt - Objective it is not

      >Russia 138th yet Russia tolerates virulent attacks on its President

      Not in any country Putin has power they don't. Putin has a solution for that pesky Western media as well.

    2. Francis Boyle Silver badge

      "virulent attacks"

      You mean people saying that they really don't like him. Not a very high bar I think.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    >US media freedom, enshrined in the First Amendment to the 1787 constitution, has encountered a major obstacle – the government’s war on whistleblowers

    Change you can believe in.

    1. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

      Except that it's not much of a change. US executive administrations and legislatures, at the federal and state levels, have generally been hostile to whistleblowers, and to freedom of the press and civil rights in general, for decades.

      There are occasional exceptions, such as the FOIA extension for electronic documents during the Clinton administration, but most of the pro-free-press stuff happened in the 1960s and 1970s. Since then it's mostly been efforts by the executives and legislatures to restrict press freedoms and access to records and meetings, with only some resistance from the courts.

      Certainly the record of the Obama administration, and Congress during that time, has not been good - and Obama's claims about promoting transparency ring hollow.

      But it's not so much "change we can believe in" as "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" - and even more the persistence of hegemonic power through the cumulative effects of a widespread network of actors, human and institutional, with various bits of influence.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        >But it's not so much "change we can believe in" as "meet the new boss, same as the old boss"

        Agree somewhat bitterly. The whole hope and change thing being a bit ironic.

  11. Youngone Silver badge
    Black Helicopters

    Explaination

    The reason New Zealand is so high on the list is because the press here only ever publishes celebrity nonsense, panegyrics on our glorious Prime Minister and sport reporting.

    There's no need for the authorities to repress the press, they've censored themselves.

    (Except Radio NZ, our own little BBC which has had it's funding frozen for the last dozen years or so).

    1. GrumpyKiwi
      Black Helicopters

      Re: Explaination

      Simple reason why the PM is so glossy - It's easy to shine at night. A more competent opposition would have long ago taken the shine off. Instead they've had incompetent after incompetent.

      Also I approve of disfunding RNZ, it's the most tediously smug bit of the airwaves by quite some margin - pretentions to be a "BBC" might play a part in that.

      1. Youngone Silver badge

        Re: Explaination

        RNZ might be smug GrumpyKiwi, but at least they make an effort to hold Ministers' feet to the fire occasionally. Have you ever heard Paul Henry "interview" a Minister? The word "Lickspittle" comes to mind.

        The unofficial Government boycott of Morning Report says a lot in my view.

        You are quite correct about the opposition, but that's what happens when a backbench MP "earns" more than $150,000 per year.

  12. Captain DaFt

    Never heard of Eritrea before

    And here it's only mentioned as the worst of the worst that so far, is still worse than the US and UK.

    Interesting. So now they have to pad out the bottom of the list to keep those bastions of democracy from looking like they're too far down the list?

    1. Triggerfish

      Re: Never heard of Eritrea before

      Might be because Eritrea is a UN member, I've heard of it once before in regards to their human rights record which is not the best.

    2. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

      Re: Never heard of Eritrea before

      Really? They were at war with Ethiopia for thirty years, ending in 1991. I know they're way over in East Africa, but still...

      And then there was another war with Ethiopia in ... let's see ... 1998-2000.

      And even for those who don't pay attention to all the myriad conflicts of the the twentieth century - and I'm sure I haven't heard of all of them either, as keeping track would be a full-time job - you'd think folks would know about this one, since Eritrea controls a big chunk of Red Sea coastline (it's what makes Ethiopia land-locked), so it's of some strategic importance.

      Anyway, it's a pretty miserable place, according to the reports I've seen (and this one certainly doesn't make it sound any better). But considering it borders Ethiopia and Sudan, and was the result of Italy's especially half-assed colonization efforts during the African Land Grab, and then the long war for independence... well, it'd be foolish to expect better.

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