Impress confirms breach of code

Impress has confirmed that 5Pillars have been found to have breached the discrimination clause of the Impress Standards Code, following a complaint from the Community Security Trust (CST) - a charity which advocates for the protection of British Jews from antisemitism and related threats.

Impress says this is in relation to an episode of the publication’s podcast - ‘Blood Brothers’ – entitled Britain First, Christian nationalism, and the Zionist agenda. It was first published to both Rumble and the 5Pillars UK website on 14 May 2024. The more than three-hour long episode featured an interview with Jayda Fransen, former deputy leader of Britain First, and described by the publisher as a ‘prominent British Christian national activist’.

It follows an Impress initiated investigation into a previous 5Pillars podcast episode that was upheld for discrimination in March 2024.

The Complainant argued that the publisher allowed the interviewee to espouse antisemitic conspiracy theories without pushback or challenge from the interviewer. Later in the episode, host Dilly Hussein set out the Great Replacement Theory to Fransen and asks the guest if she believes that this is what is currently happening. Fransen replies ‘yeah, absolutely’ and adds that it is playing out in real time. The regulatory committee felt this also received inadequate interrogation from the host.

The committee found that in both matters 5Pillars had breached clause 4.3 of the Impress Standards Code (Discrimination) for encouraging hatred or abuse against a group based on their characteristics.

In June 2024, 5Pillars gave notice that they would be leaving the Impress regulatory scheme, therefore they are under no obligation to enact the sanctions and remedies handed down by the committee.

However, the committee recommends that the publisher either amends or takes down the relevant podcast episode to comply with those recognised editorial standards set out in the Impress Standards Code.

Impress comment on 5Pillars decision to leave: “We are of course disappointed that 5Pillars came to the decision to leave Impress earlier this year.

“It is our strong belief that it is better for both publishers and the public that recognised independent regulation is taken up as widely as possible to preserve journalistic integrity across the sector.

“Unfortunately, until there are genuine incentives put in place by Government and the industry for that to happen, publications will continue to be free to do as they please, including discriminating against protected groups with no recourse or consequence.”