Daily Mail editor calls for press to be protected from political interference
Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre has issued a rallying call to the UK press, describing it as the only British institution which remains fully free of ‘government control’.
Dacre, who also oversees the Mail on Sunday and Metro, made his pronouncement in an effort to unify the newspaper industry behind protecting its independence from political interference.
In combative form Dacre said the press must ‘fight tooth and claw against those who would destroy us’, labelling the political and legal establishment as threats following the Leveson Inquiry into press standards which recommended new systems of oversight to prevent a repeat of the phone-hacking scandal.
Speaking at an event organised by the charity NewstrAid Dacre said: “The fact that there is relatively so little corruption in Britain is, I honestly believe, down to a rumbustious free press.”