The rise and rise of community-based news reporting
Following on from my first article – “Fake news” or “No news” – the twin threats to democracy – does local news matter? If your answer is ‘no’, then don’t read on. No! Cancel that thought. You, above all, should read on and here’s why.
Think of the things that impact on your life on a daily basis – housing, planning, council tax, roads,education, health, life and death…. Think of what’s going on around you within ten miles of where you live and ask: “who is responsible for this?”
Who would you call to account, to point the finger at, and say: “you are responsible for this and I want answers”? If not you, who?
The standard answers would be that you contact your local councillor and failing that your MP. Some would say that these representatives should proactively attend to our interests and in some places, they do. For example, in Hastings, their Grotbuster programme was set up in 2000 as a response to public concern at the town’s high number of run down and derelict buildings. It worked and some 900 buildings have been transformed and it has been a model for other councils. It has also helped make Hastings a destination of choice for those fleeing from London.
In sharp contrast, when FHDC’s leader, David Monk, was asked to intervene in response to concerns over one iconic local building, all that resulted was an action for defamation from the building’s owner. Now here’s what local MP Damian Collins has to say about the hottest local story captured in two headlines, staying loyal to the party line:
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“We remain on track to meet the government stated objective to ensure that by the middle of February, all vulnerable people, and people aged over the age of 70 will have received their vaccine”.
Here are our two hot headlines: KentLive:
And KentOnline:
Both report that “Folkestone has the highest coronavirus death rate in the United Kingdom – but “practical issues mean it will be the last place in Kent to receive the vaccine.”
My concern and criticism is, that beyond factual reporting of the statistics, and some reporting of individual concerns, there was no attempt whatsoever to deploy the most powerful words any reporter should have etched on his or own brain and bring to bear on each and every story:
“I keep six honest serving-men
(They taught me all I knew)
Their names are What and Where and When
And How and Why and Who.”
So, when I see that from January 4th, four local residents a day are dying, and Folkestone has the highest death rate in the country, a quote from unnamed Kent health bosses blaming ‘practical issues’ and another from an NHS spokesman for the Kent and Medway Clinical Commissioning Group saying that “the NHS across Kent and Medway is working hard to establish vaccination services for all areas,” leaves me begging to see some questions asked.
But it gets worse: “The GP-led service in Folkestone was due to start this week but practical issues around preparing the site means this will now be next week.”
What practical issues? We have known since November that a roll-out of vaccinations would take place in the new year. The Oaklands Primary Care Network in Hythe was making plans in November and has been vaccinating for several weeks. Why haven’t these questions been asked by reporters for Kentonline and KentLive? They must surely have a little black book of useful numbers.
It’s not a matter of looking for scapegoats, but of a genuine desire to seek out the truth of why something that should have happened, hasn’t happened. Our local press has a public duty to ask these questions, but to quote George Monbiot in the Guardian:
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“For many years the local press has been one of Britain’s most potent threats to democracy, championing the overdog, misrepresenting democratic choices, defending business, the police and local elites from those who seek to challenge them.”
Excellent !!!
if it wasn’t for local reporting then the Dymchurch Parish Council’s ‘leak’ regarding SDC’s secretive attempt for a second go for a Nuclear Dump on Romney Marsh after the local referendum which produced a decisive ‘No’,would never have come to light and subsequently shelved (hopefully still shelved or is it?).
Time to challenge the cosy clique that claim to report the news. Not fit to wipe my arse with…… Or anyone elses