The Courier Mail: A Feral Newspaper

I was reminded today of a brilliant quote from 'Yes, Prime Minister' about British newspapers and their readers:

Sir Humphrey: The only way to understand the Press is to remember that they pander to their readers' prejudices.

Jim Hacker: Don't tell me about the Press. I know exactly who reads the papers. The Daily Mirror is read by the people who think they run the country. The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country. The Times is read by the people who actually do run the country. The Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country. The Financial Times is read by people who own the country. The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country. The Daily Telegraph is read by the people who think it is.

Sir Humphrey: Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun?

Bernard Woolley: Sun readers don't care who runs the country - as long as she's got big tits.

Apart from just being very funny this does point to the remarkable diversity of Britain’s daily newspapers. In Queensland there is unfortunately only one daily newspaper called the Courier Mail. (One can of course get other national newspapers - which aren’t much better - but it’s only the Courier that focuses on the Queensland Government).

Disappointing then that it’s a complete rag. One case in point was a neither funny nor smart article at the weekend. It was supposed to be a satirical account of a bedroom conversation between Premier Anna Bligh and her husband Greg Withers (a senior public servant and Head of the Office for Climate Change). In the print version they had a double page spread with photo-shopped pictures of them in bed. Even if one thought that acceptable coverage for some public figures, it’s really a very crass way to attack the Premier and serves nothing but to undermine and discredit the office. And yes the Courier Mail is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation - so it is very much a regular ad hominem attack.

I’m a strong supporter of the Reithian market failure approach to broadcasting and the media. What does this argue?

• That there are various positive externalities to community and society from having breadth and depth in media, such as improved debate and dialogue in society and hence greater ability to hold governments to account and improve the policy making and legislative process.
  
  


• That the value individuals gain from being informed or educated is never fully captured in market prices, and therefore that we tend to get an under-supply of good quality public information.
  
  


• That given there are increasing returns to scale in media, an unregulated market is likely to become dominated by a small number of providers (e.g. Rupert Murdoch) who then have power to exploit market price or can dump low quality products on the market.
  
  


• That there are informational deficiencies in media – e.g. that consumers may be unable to detect better or worse quality without experiencing the full spectrum of choices.

Which points to a couple of things. First, the importance of regulation and management of the media sector to avoid monopoly and market abuse. Second, that consumers are key. If they don’t demand better quality it won’t be supplied. (And unfortunately there isn’t really a culture of intellectual rigour or scrutiny in Queensland to trigger new entry). Third, there’s a strong argument for public support and subsidy. Mind due I'm not sure any of these arguments apply that well to the case of the Courier Mail.

Still, annoying to be stuck with no alternatives...