bogeyman
22nd May 2022, 14:50
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61528286
No journalist enjoys attempts at censorship. We often face restrictions, but I had never encountered anything like this - a vast list of things the government wanted to ban me saying about an abusive MI5 agent I had spent a long time investigating.
I received the list during the months-long legal battle between the BBC and the government. I had been investigating a state informant for some time, and when we put the findings to the government, they took us to court. It eventually ran to 54 pages and included a series of arguments about the government's demands. They wanted to stop our story about the agent who can only be referred to as X.
The right-wing extremist had used his security service role to terrorise and coerce his British girlfriend, who we are calling Beth. In one incident, which she recorded on her mobile phone, he attacked her with a machete. Evidence we gathered establishes he had also threatened to kill women and children, and was a sexual threat to young girls.
I was the main witness in the legal case to defend reporting on the story. The litigation process took over my life. The pressure was significant and I had many low moments. My journalism was under scrutiny - with government lawyers critically examining every detail in the large volume of evidence, and challenging the accuracy of our work.
We argued that it was important to identify X so that other women he encountered could be warned about him and the abusive behaviour our investigation had uncovered. The security service, however, argued that naming X would create an unacceptable danger to him from extremists and discourage other people from acting as informants, which would damage national security.
The government initially asked for the right to exercise written approval over our reporting. This would have amounted to ministers having editorial control over our story, which we argued in court would be "repugnant" to any media organisation but particularly the BBC, with its charter obligation of independence from government.
No journalist enjoys attempts at censorship. We often face restrictions, but I had never encountered anything like this - a vast list of things the government wanted to ban me saying about an abusive MI5 agent I had spent a long time investigating.
I received the list during the months-long legal battle between the BBC and the government. I had been investigating a state informant for some time, and when we put the findings to the government, they took us to court. It eventually ran to 54 pages and included a series of arguments about the government's demands. They wanted to stop our story about the agent who can only be referred to as X.
The right-wing extremist had used his security service role to terrorise and coerce his British girlfriend, who we are calling Beth. In one incident, which she recorded on her mobile phone, he attacked her with a machete. Evidence we gathered establishes he had also threatened to kill women and children, and was a sexual threat to young girls.
I was the main witness in the legal case to defend reporting on the story. The litigation process took over my life. The pressure was significant and I had many low moments. My journalism was under scrutiny - with government lawyers critically examining every detail in the large volume of evidence, and challenging the accuracy of our work.
We argued that it was important to identify X so that other women he encountered could be warned about him and the abusive behaviour our investigation had uncovered. The security service, however, argued that naming X would create an unacceptable danger to him from extremists and discourage other people from acting as informants, which would damage national security.
The government initially asked for the right to exercise written approval over our reporting. This would have amounted to ministers having editorial control over our story, which we argued in court would be "repugnant" to any media organisation but particularly the BBC, with its charter obligation of independence from government.