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Censorship

01 January 1991

Censorship
artdoc August=1993

In September 1992, BBC2 broadcast a discussion of political
violence on its `Nation' series. Participants included a
representative of the African National Congress (ANC), former
Northern Ireland Minister Peter Bottomley and Bernadette
McAliskey. For some of the discussion McAliskey's voice was
replaced by subtitles because a senior BBC editor judged that
what she said fell within the terms of the 1988 broadcasting ban.
This is supposed to prevent broadcasts which support or invite
support for political violence and it is routinely used to
prevent the voices of Sinn F in members being broadcast on TV or
radio. McAliskey, who is not a member of Sinn F in, applied for
a judicial review of the BBC's decision and Justice MacPherson
ruled that judicial review was the wrong remedy, she should take
an action for defamation instead. In July, however, Lords
Bingham, Steyn and Waite overturned MacPherson's ruling,
appreciating the point that explanations of political violence
are not the same as justifications or support for violence, where
the line might be drawn between the two requires a full hearing
in court.
The Dublin High Court ruled on 16 July that the RTE (television
station) was correct to use section 31 of the Broadcasting Act
to ban a 20 second radio advertisement for a book of short
stories published by Brandon Books. The author of the book
entitled `The Street' is Gerry Adams, the President of Sinn F in
and the advert included his voice. The legal argument turned on
whether Adams the novelist could be distinguished from Adams the
politician. The judgement appears to widen the scope of Section
31 following the recent ruling that RTE was wrong to ban an
interview with a trade unionist involved in a strike simply
because he was a member of Sinn F in.

Statewatch vol 3 no 4 July-August 1993