Page 167 - An Introduction to Political Communication Third Edition

COMMUNICATING POLITICS

reported on key news bulletins and at locations accessible to
journalists. None of which ensures, of course, that coverage will
be favourable. The débâcle of ‘Jennifer’s Ear’ (see Chapter 6), when
the Labour Party’s attempt to set the 1992 campaign agenda on
health turned into a debate about ethics and manipulation which
challenged the party’s integrity (as it did that of the Conservatives),
involved a series of news conferences in which spokespersons
sought to reclaim the initiative, largely without success. As Butler
and Kavanagh observe

the way in which the war of Jennifer’s ear captured the
agenda was the most extraordinary episode in the
campaign on the air, explicable only in terms of the
mounting frustration amongst journalists at a boring
campaign and the intensity of news management by the
parties. Frustrations boiled over, news management
collapsed, the ratpack soared off out of control, scenting a
‘real’ story at last, and both parties and broadcasters
lurched off course.
(1992, p. 164)

At news conferences tears were shed, tempers lost, and recrimi-
nations made as Labour sought unsuccessfully to bring the media’s
agenda back into line with its own.
Despite the dangers inherent in using ‘free media’, the news-
worthiness of live television interviews and debates ensures that no
party leader or head of government can refuse to participate in them
to some degree. To minimise the risks politicians employ public
relations professionals, whose job it is to attempt to ensure that the
interpretation of a speaker’s words (or gaffes) is a convenient and
desirable one. These ‘spin doctors’ seek to shape the journalistic
agenda in making sense of their employers’ discourse. This they may
do by issuing press releases clarifying ambiguous or contradictory
remarks, having quiet words with key journalists and pundits or
giving news conferences. Leading politicians will also employ the
services of ‘minders’, who manage the details of media encounters
and attempt to anticipate and neutralise risks. In Britain, following
the rise of Tony Blair and the election of Labour to government, the
most famous (and infamous) of these became Alistair Campbell, the
new Prime Minister’s press secretary. Campbell did in government
what he had done in opposition – seduced, cajoled, harried and
intimidated the media from behind the scenes into giving his leader

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