“The growing influence of the PR industry and spin-doctors on media content is reducing newspapers to nothing more than publicity sheets for industry and big business” (Keeble 2009). How true is this?

Public Relations (PR), is the management of the way information gets from the organization to the general public. The PR industry is responsible for creating a mutual connection between an organization and the public; also, the PR industry does strive to present the company to the public, employees, business partners and the rest of the stakeholders as having a specific perspective regarding the way its lead, its services and products, and its political viewpoint. Spin-doctors are agents whose roles are to interpret and tailor events to journalists in a way that favours an influential person or a public figure like a politician.
“The growing influence of the PR industry and spin-doctors on media content is reducing newspapers to nothing more than publicity sheets for industry and big business.” This is a true statement as there have been criticism of companies that practices such behaviours. The following criticisms on major figures and media companies are stark examples of the extent that the influence on PR industry and spin-doctors has grown.
In an incident,Richard Desmond who owns the Express Newspapers was blamed by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) of disguising advertorials in a way that was meant to flout the advertising code. The Express Newspaper was noted by the advertising watchdog as having on a number of times to have ran the features of particular products that were near-identical “on the same page as regular adverts for the same products.” Based on the opinion of the watchdog, there were inefficacies about the reports that were made on the adverts and on being pressed, the Daily Express said that the features of the products were collected during the “usual journalistic practice” and later the advertiser getting a completed copy (Mark 2009). Based on the ruling of the watchdog, depending on the trend of the articles there was a high possibility that “a commercial arrangement existed between the newspaper and the advertiser” with the “advertiser exerting a sufficient degree of control.” Another case still involving the Daily Express showed an advert on one of its page’s bottom half while an article ran on the top half; with the absence of the words “advertisement feature”, a reader could have thought that the advert was a “a supplement to ease joint pain as an article.” In crisp words, the case was an ethical issue since the editorial became an advertorial, with the brands given an editorial space that they don’t deserve; with the “commercial arrangement between” the advertiser and the newspaper shows a media that is not independent.
Creating “news” and slant coverage. According to the advertising watchdog, the Daily Express ran almost similar ads of the LIPObind product with the ad being made on the top half of its pages an article with the bottom half being an ad. In the top half of the advert was, “how Katy Hill used LIPObind to lose weight…lost four stones and that you can reduce the amount of fat your body absorbs.” This ad was made a slant coverage in favour of the client, the advertiser , because as the watchdog argued, there lacked evidence to support claim that LIPObind could make one lose weight.
When buying Channel Five in 2010, Richard Desmond’s aim promoting the channel using his publications. The story was featured higher that that of Joanna Yeates’ murder investigation, the two stories one of the Arizona shooting which claimed six lives and a U.S Congresswoman injured and an article on the scientists’ belief that Cambridge would be on the coast due to rising sea levels. The Desmond’s newspapers didn’t report while other newspapers were reporting the shooting in Arizona; while the other media were reporting the news, Desmond’s newspapers were busy promoting Channel Five. When Desmond’s newspapers finally started reporting those news, the news articles were below this utter non-story.” Also, Leo McKinstry, a political columnist, wrote a whole column to praise “The Mentalist,” the TV show that Channel Five was broadcasting (Pickard 2011). This is precise explanation supports the statement on how newspapers have been reduced to publicity sheets for industry and big business.
The newspapers and magazines that Richard Desmond owned were banned from the press self-regulation system. This was a result of Northern & Shell, a company owned by Desmond refusing to pay the Press Standards Board of Finance (PressBof) fees, fees that are used to fund the Press Complaints Commission (Sweney 2009). The failure to pay resulted in the cancellation of all Northern & Shell self-regulatory system titles. Lord (Guy) Black, the chairman of PressBof said that the paying of those fees meant that a publisher was committed to “the editors’ code of practice, the ethical standards and the commitment to the protection of the public.” (Roy 2011). Amazingly, other newspapers and magazines were committed to the self-regulation. The persons who wanted to complain about the Daily Express had nowhere to complain to. The lies that Desmond’s newspapers spins will not be subject to scrutiny and it will get away with them.
George (2012) on his article argued about the untrustworthiness of the Positive Weather Solutions (PWS) weather forecasts ran on the Daily Mail, Express. This came amid claims that PWS weather forecasts were questioningly being favoured by some tabloid newspapers. As George pointed out, PWS was boastful that it had “made the front page of the Daily Express thirteen times” and the claimed that “between 26 September and 1 October, the Daily Express quoted it every single day.” The writer pointed out a suggestion that the credentials of the weather forecasters were “inadequate, their methods inscrutable and their results unreliable.” The writer cites an example of Serena Skye, a PWS weather forecaster who juggles between being a “mail-order bride, a hot Russian date and a hot Ukrainian date”; also, Emma Pearson who is the “PWS’s assistant weather forecaster and features on 49,800 hairdressing sites.” Another report that was made by Daily Mail in 2010 read that, “the country is on course for a barbecue summer” and that that “time, the prediction comes from a forecaster with a somewhat better record on the subject than the poor old Met Office (PWS).” The said PWS had “no published record at all” and what it had made a forecast as “stifling temperatures and the warmest record UK summer record, in fact was an unremarkable summer.” Terming the PWS as “a forecaster with a better record than the poor old Met Office” was a spin-doctored act by the Daily Mail and it contradicted with the truth since PWS had no published truth and the spin-doctoring was aimed at favouring their client, PWS, and its vested interests.
The newspaper spin-doctors have been involved in the fabrication of some reports that to some extent have involved a matter of life and death issues. Alistair Campbell, formerly a Daily Mirror reporter and Blair’s spokesman, narrated to the Leveson inquiry the influence of some people made the newspaper industry to “besmirch the name of virtually every journalist in the country” (Rachael 2011). He described how the British tabloids had defamed him by falsely reporting that he had quitted Downing Street, also, that his father had died. This shows how the newspapers spin-doctors fabricate reports aimed at serving the interests that have been vested in the newspaper industry.
Charlotte Church, a British singer and a former child star described how she thought that newspapers hacked her phone so that they could gets reports of her pregnancy and her daughter’s birth. She then narrated how an article in Sunday Times falsely reported details that led to a backlash against her thereby forcing her to hire security agents in U.S. The falsified reports claimed that she “criticised the firefighters who had risked their lives on September 11.” Church also described her discontentment with the reports regarding her that were made by the Sun newspaper owned by the News International (Brown 2011). The news were about a “countdown clock to her 16th birthday… the innuendo was that she would then be at the legal age for sex.” To her, the countdown was bizarre and she and her family were greatly affected. Church believed her mother’s suicide was in some part caused by the News of the World article titled, “Church three in a bed cocaine shock.” Similar issues involving Sun were when Anne Diamond, a British TV celebrity, accused the newspaper of “splashing a photo of her baby son’s funeral on its front page and pressuring her to front its campaign to raise money for research into cot deaths, emotionally blackmailing her.” Such celebrity stories, despite some of them being fabricated (such as Church’s case) by the newspaper’s spin-doctors would rake in the company more profit and thus mere publicity sheets for big business.
The fabrication of reports knows no age bracket, being made on even young children. JK Rowling, the Harry Potter author criticised the British Press for what she termed as the intrusion of her daughter’s privacy. She described how a “tabloid reporter contacted a headmaster” with a false statement that “her daughter had upset classmates by telling them the boy wizard died in the last book in the best-selling series” (ABC News 2011). Rowling’s daughter’s privacy intrusion claims came amid those of “actress Sienna Miller’s and former Formula One boss Max Mosley that the News of the World tabloid abuse.” Considering what Rowling said, that the journalist’s letter “came in the first flush of success of her books which had sold more than 400 million copies and spawned a lucrative film series,”and how “a journalist pretending to be from the tax office called her husband and got him to disclose his salary and address”; it could be that the News of the World tabloid and the newspaper that the journalist in the latter case worked for, there sure was some vested interest in its “big business” which was scavenging for reports to boost its newspaper sales.
The newspaper industry ruthlessly tracks and “investigates” the Hollywood celebrities and influential persons for reports (White 2008). As reported in the ABC News, Notting Hill actor Hugh Grant was to “join parents of murder victims to spell out how they and their families have suffered from a ruthless hunt for stories to boost flagging paper sales.” As lawyer David Sherbone reported, the aim of targeting those celebrities was to “make money for the papers…that’s why it was done: to sell newspapers. Not to detect crime or to expose wrongdoing; not to protect society or for the public good.” As the ABC News article writer described, that the newspaper’s aim to “to sate a public’s clamour for gossip about the rich and famous”; these statements greatly conforms with this paper’s aim of lambasting the newspapers as propelled by the “growing influence of the PR industry” and the newspapers merely public sheets for industry and big business” (Haydon 2006). In precise words, the newspapers “sate the public’s clamour for gossip” and this satiety means more profit for the industry as the reports are in high demand. Unfortunately, since the source of the reports to suit the newspaper industry are not readily available, the newspapers’ journalists will use “’tawdry’ tactics to find exclusives” or use their spin-doctors to fabricate and tailor reports that will either favour their clients or for their welfare and vested interests.

References
ABC News. Celebrities turn spotlight on press at UK inquiry. Accessed March 10, 2012 from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-11-21/celebrities-turn-spotlight-on-press-at-uk-inquiry/3684138
Brown, R. 2011. Blair’s spin doctor describes ‘putrid’ UK press. Accessed March 10, 2012 from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-01/alistair-campbell-fronts-media-inquiry/3705546
Greenslade, R. 2011. Richard Desmond shows further contempt for his readers. [online]. Accessed March 10, 2012 from http://minority-thought.com/media/2011/01/richard-desmond-shows-further-contempt-for-his-readers
Haydon, A. 2006. Where the Truth Lies- Trust and Morality in PR and Journalism. Accessed March 10, 2012 from http://www.culturewars.org.uk/2006-01/hobsbawm.htm
Pickard, M. 2011. Desmond values promoting Channel Five more than reporting news. [online]. Accessed March 10, 2012 from http://minority-thought.com/media/2011/01/desmond-values-promoting-channel-five-more-than-reporting-news
Sweney, M.2009. ASA raps Richard Desmond’s Express Newspapers over advertorials. [online]. Accessed March 10, 2012 from http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/aug/12/express-newspapers-advertorials-richard-desmond-asa
Keeble, R. 2009. Ethics for Journalists. London : Taylor & Francis.
White, A. 2008. To Tell You The Truth: the Ethical Journalism Initiative. Brussels, Belgium : International Federation of Journalists.