President, Hong Kong is a society with a high degree of freedom. Hong Kong people very much support freedom of the press, and we have all along been staunch supporters of the media. However, there has been much negative news about the media recently, including the turmoil caused by the replacement of the chief editor of Ming Pao, the media credibility falling to an all-time low after the reunification, and so on, which have aroused concern about the development of the media in the long term. As the media is a topic under discussion in the Legislative Council today, I think the credibility of the media does warrant reflection by society.
Recently, the School of Journalism and Communication of The Chinese University of Hong Kong has published the findings of a survey on the credibility of the news media. The findings show that the overall media credibility in Hong Kong has fallen to a new low since 1997. According to the academic responsible for conducting the survey, the findings of the survey have pointed to public dissatisfaction with the performance of the press sector, and the reason for a lower credibility has to do with the performance of the media in that the reports and commentaries made by some media are not fair and impartial. For example, some media have adopted sensational reporting practices or biased political stances and made mistakes in the news reports from time to time.
Besides, the Public Opinion Programme of the University of Hong Kong also conducted a survey in October last year. Affected by the furore over free television licences, public ratings of the overall performance of the media and freedom of the press were all down but still, 53% of the respondents said that they were satisfied with the press freedom situation in Hong Kong and only 28% of them were dissatisfied with it. The findings also showed that 53% of the respondents were of the view that the media had misused or abused freedom of the press.
In fact, although it is impossible for an all-time low in media credibility to be entirely unrelated to freedom of the press, we can see from the above surveys and the actual situation that the lower credibility is more directly related to the performance of the media.
Over a long period of time, some media have attached little importance to the principle of objectivity and fairness in news reporting, using exaggerations or malicious criticisms in reporting news and failing to adopt a neutral and balanced approach in the choice of news materials or resorting to stalking or unlawful means to achieve their purpose. Moreover, some programme hosts have dominated the speaking time in their programmes and even resorted to vicious attacks, making the programmes far from neutral and balanced. From these practices adopted by the media in handling news, we may perhaps appreciate why public rating of the media has fallen continuously.
I have heard many people say that while they found the squabbles or hubbub created by these news reports interesting initially, they were nevertheless gradually influenced by these negative emotions, thinking that they themselves were most important, that they were most correct, and that it was always other people’s fault, such as the Government’s fault, society’s fault, and so on. Their mood would then turn from bad to worse, to the extent that they would hurl criticisms and abuses at their family members or friends around them. Therefore, many people eventually chose not to listen to or read such news anymore.
At this meeting today, a number of Members have talked about freedom of the press, but Members may not have noticed that freedom of the press has a twin brother and that is, media ethics. Where there is freedom of the press, there must be media ethics, and freedom of the press is restrained by media ethics. If we advocate freedom without stressing ethics, and if freedom is infinitely expanded, it will be easily turned into a devil once it is used by people with bad intentions. Freedom of the press is a public instrument, and a sharp weapon of media workers who resolutely uphold media ethics. It is absolutely not an “umbrella” for protection of people without integrity.
Certainly, what I have just said refers only to some members of the media sector. Most of the media people whom I know have all demonstrated professional dedication to their job. They do not only handle news with a professional and stringent attitude, but they also firmly uphold media ethics while defending freedom of the press. They are worthy of our continuous support. In fact, people working in the media sector have to work long hours but their income is not proportional to the efforts they made. What is more, with the rapid development of new media in recent years, the operation of traditional media will grow increasingly difficult and this does warrant greater concern from society.
Lastly, I would like to talk about the Ming Pao incident. I certainly support freedom of the press, and as a reader who has subscribed to Ming Pao for nearly 40 years, I very much hope that Ming Pao can continuously uphold the editorial principles that it has adopted for many years in the past, including a balanced, fair and comprehensive approach in news reporting. For instance, it should report news about criticisms made against the Government and it should also include reports about the difficulties of the Government in administration, in order to enable readers to grasp the full picture of the actual situation. I think these are precisely the traditional values in which Ming Pao has all along taken pride. In fact, readers of Ming Pao include a relatively large number of middle-class people who are impartial and who wish to receive comprehensive but not lopsided information.
This time around, many staff members of Ming Pao have come forth to express their views and this shows that they truly feel worried. But I wish to point out that while a newspaper operates on commercial principles on the one hand, it bears social responsibilities on the other. So, from the angle of operation, the appointment and removal of senior staff members of a newspaper by the boss actually gives no cause for criticism. What warrants our concern is whether the successor appointed to take over the job can in future fulfil the responsibilities given to the newspaper by society. If not, there would be reasons to make criticisms. We cannot find a person guilty before anything has happened. Furthermore, if the boss made a wrong decision, the readers would naturally go away and the boss would naturally have to make changes. Therefore, I think it is indeed premature to pass judgment on this incident at this stage.
I so submit.