As reported by the Newspaper Society: Speaking at a Newspaper Conference quarterly lunch on Monday, the Justice Secretary said that the Committee would produce a report on the industry’s Charter “sooner rather than later.”
Asked by NS director David Newell when the sub committee was likely to report, Mr Grayling responded: “I’m not actually sure about the planned timing. We’ve all looked quite carefully at the detail, we want to take a decision sooner rather than later.
“It’s a complicated issue for obvious reasons.”
Mr Grayling is one of eight MPs in a Privy Council committee which was formed to look at the industry’s Royal Charter for regulation of the press. It is chaired jointly by Danny Alexander, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, and Culture Secretary Maria Miller.
At the Conference lunch chaired by the Birmingham Mail’s political editor Jon Walker, Mr Grayling said he didn’t believe the regional press should sit outside a new regulatory regime, “but equally what we’ve got try and do is make sure that we don’t create a system that cripples regional press as well.”
He added: “So we are trying to steer the ship as smoothly as we can. I couldn’t honestly give you a definite date but I would expect us to have a report produced sooner rather than later.”
At the lunch, Mr Grayling spoke to regional press political editors and correspondents about a wide variety of issues including cuts to legal aid, the prison service, and the Syria crisis.
