The Press Complaints Commision (PCC)

• Set up in 1991 to replace the Press Council
• Independant body dealing with complaints about editorial content of newspapers and magazines in the UK and their websites
• Not a legal system
• Voluntary agreement by the newspaper and magazine industry to allow itself to be regulated.
• Code of practice drawn up by a committee of editors.
• Commision itself has a majority of public members
• 10 out of 17 Commisioners (including Chairman) have no connection to newspapers and magazines
• Code of practice has 16 sections and covers 4 main areas:
• Accuracy
• Privacy
• News gathering
• Protecting the vulnerable
• Code doesn't cover taste and decency; it's a democratic society
• PCC funded through Press Standards Board of Finance (PressBof) which collects money from newspapers and magaiznes in the UK.
• Each newspaper/magazine contributes in proportion to the number of people who buy and read it (circulation)
• Members of the public do not pay for the service in any way
• The PCC accepts complaints from anyone who believes an article involving them breaches the Code in any way
• In 2007, 1.5 % of complaints came people in the public eye with 95.8 % from ordinary members of the public.
• The Code provides special protection to particularly vulnerable groups such as children, hospital patients and those at risk of discrimination.
• The majority of complaints regard regional newspapers - readers care about their locality