Without healthy, thriving newspapers and investigative journalists prepared to ask difficult questions of security services, the UK will move closer to a bona fide police state, British journalist Tony Gosling told RT.
RT:We often hear of journalists being intimidated for
the work they are doing in other countries, but Britain has so
far maintained a reputation of having press freedom. Is this
about to change?
Tony Gosling: Well it’s already sliding, isn’t it? I think
we’ve seen over the last few months, particularly since this
Snowden revelation, that there are divided loyalties. The problem
particularly being that actually the Pentagon was involved in
this decision, to make this arrest of David Miranda. A horrendous
situation to be in, he’s got no access to a lawyer. He’s in, sort
of, an extrajudicial area in the transit lounge of Heathrow
Airport. So it seems to me the police doing the arresting at
Heathrow should be thinking about who pays their wages. Is it the
British taxpayer, or is it the Pentagon?
RT:The Guardian’s editor-in-chief said that officials
forced him to destroy NSA data. Could he have reacted
differently? And if so, what would be the implications of
that?
TG: It’s extremely difficult for the editor of a big
newspaper like the Guardian to take these people on because they
do rely on them for comments and stories, as well...This is
really important for the public to understand, when something
like the arrest of David Miranda takes place, the effect is it
actually discourages our newspapers and other journalists from
doing their work. Particularly when you have situations like what
happened on Sunday where they’re taking someone on long
detention. Not only are specific bits of information being taken,
but we also have to ask the question, “What is the story that
would be going around the world today if they hadn’t made those
arrests?” Of course they’re using the Terrorism Act to do this -
Clause 7 of the Terrorism Act. We have to ask ourselves, “Is this
person actually really a terrorist? Was this what the legislation
was originally passed for?” Now if we don’t have healthy,
thriving newspapers and investigative journalists prepared to ask
the difficult questions of our security services, we’re moving
closer and closer to a police state here in Britain.
RT:The Guardian says it’s been doing most of its
reporting and editing on the NSA scandal from New York and not
from London. Why is that? Does it mean that US laws for
journalists are better than UK laws?
TG: Well you’re absolutely right. It’s in the US
Constitution, the protection for the right of the free press. We
don’t have such a thing here in Britain. All we rely on is the
goodwill of the establishment over the years to make sure we do
have a free press. And also, that’s plural press - lots of
different outlets, lots of different voices, lots of different
editors. This is putting that under threat, isn’t it? One by one,
the bravest, most outspoken of the people - literally these are
the public’s eyes and ears. They’re being stopped. They’re being
covered by the police in doing things like this. Let’s remember
what this is all about in the first place. Let’s not lose sight
of that. What’s been going on here by the NSA, by the GCHQ, is
the biggest, [most] illegal fishing operation in history. Massive
amounts of data - personal and private data of individuals who
are innocent, who have done nothing wrong - is being illegally
collected by these organizations. We need to know why, who has
done that. My personal opinion is that the people behind it, who
authorized it, should go to jail.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.