Well, July produced yet another seismic change in politics with yet another change in Prime Minister and a re-shuffled cabinet.

Since 2011 when I started campaigning for a better press, we have had 7 different Prime Ministers, 9 Home Secretaries, and 12 Culture Secretaries. If you also include 6 leaders of the opposition parties, 8 shadow home secretaries and 13 shadow culture Secretaries, not to mention various leaders and spokespeople for the other parties, you should get an idea of the mammoth task all campaigners have in trying to politically engage with our law and decision makers.

For Hacked Off it was a challenging and high-stakes time, the Campaign having spent 2 years advising politicians on the urgent need of action on press reform (and the risks of not doing so), many of us felt pessimistic about starting the process once again.

The relentless sniping, frequent inaccuracies and shameless criticism of Keir Starmer by the British Press was a case study in how to demean a man, resort to constant personal attacks rather than fair examination of policy and deny the public balanced and accurate information. As ever, skewing the debate to fit the agenda of the owners, rather than properly and fairly holding politicians to account.

Some of those criticisms may well have been fair, but without balance and immersed in a wave of misinformation and vitriol criticising everything he said and did, how would any of us know the difference.

Hacked Off held a public rally on 24^th June which, despite the onslaught of the first heatwave, was very well attended, and it was clear that the issue of press reform is just as important to the general public as it ever was. Recognising that accurate and timely information by our mainstream press is important not only to the treatment of individuals making the news, but also to our understanding of climate change, VAWG, immigration, NHS, the economy, political discourse, and many other issues.

I can’t quite believe that our new Prime Minister Andy Burnham has only been in office for 3 weeks (as I write) and yet there have been a cavalcade of major announcements, speeches interviews and social media, the likes of which I don’t recall ever experiencing before.

Sadly, nothing specifically about press reform yet, however there was a brief reference to press conduct.

During his major speech on Social Care reform Andy Burnham made these pleas to the press …

‘I’m not going to be deflected by the point scoring or the screaming headlines that comes out of that point scoring. That is what has set back social care.’

‘I come back to this point about the political culture of this country and the media culture of this country.’

‘If we’re trying to shut down the fact that you have a serious debate about an issue like this, if that’s what that is trying to do, well, it’s shame on all of us if we let that happen.’

He then made his strongest appeal directly against sensational reporting:

‘I would never forgive myself if I left without having tried because of some of the headlines that will inevitably appear, and some of the efforts that some people will make to create scare stories about the whole issue.’

He immediately challenged that style of reporting:

‘Well, you can’t create scare stories when people are already scared by what they’re seeing anyway through their own eyes in their own homes or in care homes.’

‘You can’t create scare stories for the staff when they’re kind of living the life that they have to live.’

Finally, he criticised tax-focused headlines that overlook the people already paying enormous care costs:

‘You can have as many headlines as you like about this tax or something else, but when people are losing hundreds of thousands of pounds, everything they’ve worked for, well, what about them? And it seems that those stories don’t really often think about the people who’ve already lost far, far more.’

Earlier in the speech, he also appealed for more responsible reporting:

‘Everybody needs to engage in it responsibly, needs to remember who they are talking about, what they are talking about, the people who work within it. And to do it respectfully, and to do it accurately.’

Hopefully he gets it, he gets how our toxic press manipulates political debate to the detriment of the public, and the advantage of the political agenda of our news organisations. How it affects every one of us, and how we understand the biggest issues of the day.

As for Hacked Off, at least this time, the country has a Culture Secretary in Lisa Nandy who understands the issue, having been in post for the last two years, and have a Prime Minister who appears to get how important it is. Will the political courage he is ready to exert also be channelled into reforming the 4^th estate, and change the political discourse in the country for the better? Britain needs and deserves a better press.