tim's experiment

We all love the ICAC. Some of us hate graft, some of us have been brainwashed by their advertising, some of us just enjoy seeing millionaires arrested. But we all love ’em. Still, there is such a thing as pushing your luck.

Lurking on the back page of the Business Post this morning was a little Lai See snippet recording that the author, Howard Winn, had attended the first day of a three-day Symposium organised by the ICAC on the theme of “Fighting Corruption in a Changing World”. On his arrival Mr Winn was shunted to the press corral, which was behind a rope at the back of the room and was totally unfurnished. That’s right: no seats. It was as bare as a police press pen and I suspect almost as far from the action. Mr Winn pleaded his advanced age and was eventually allowed to sit with the delegates. The other reporters were kept standing in the press pen. I imagine they were pretty pissed off. If there is one thing worse than being expected to cover three days of speeches standing up it is seeing the SCMPost person getting favourable treatment again.

Now I suppose forcing the reporters to stand up doesn’t come up to much in the cruel and unusual punishment category. The pews which now clutter European cburches were a 19th century innovation: before that people stood for the entire proceedings and sermons sometimes lasted for three hours. When I was a sports reporter we sometimes had a press box, sometimes had a seat and a phone, and sometimes just stood on the touchline or the riverbank with the rest of the punters. This being in England it was usually raining, too. Still, what is acceptable in these matters varies from place to place and from time to time. In the early 80s lunch meetings were a favoured venue for officials to make announcements. Reporters often turned up and were given the same food as everyone else. Later the organisers of these things replaced the full lunch for reporters with a pile of sandwiches and a cup of tea on the Press Table. Later still the free refreshments for the scribes disappeared altogether, at roughly the same time as the government official speakers did. Nowadays such meetings are rarely reported. If one turned up to a meeting of this kind now refreshments would be a pleasant surprise. You would, though, and this is the point which I have been approaching rather timidly, expect a seat.

And this brings me to the big puzzle. The ICAC has a large and well-manned unit headed by a seasoned press pusher from the Information Services Department, devoted to cultivating its relationships with the local press. What were this crew, who are all employed at unimaginable expense to the public purse, thinking? Was the press invitation only meant to cover the opening ceremony? Was this a cunning wheeze to make sure that nobody would stay to cover anything else? It does not take much for well-intentioned organisations to stay on the right side of reporters. We no longer expect red packets. The ICAC being the ICAC, even such modest presents as a sandwich and an OJ may be off limits. But for crying out loud at least give people a seat!