Journalistic privilege

By: Law is Cool · October 23, 2009 · Filed Under Constitutional Law, Media Law · 1 Comment 

Paper fights to shield its source

Tonda MacCharles writes for the Toronto Star:

The constitutional guarantee of a free press is “meaningless” if it does not protect journalists from being forced to reveal the identity of confidential sources, media lawyers argued Wednesday before the Supreme Court of Canada.

In the second case this year revolving around the role confidential sources play in freedom of the press, lawyers for The Globe and Mail, a group of Quebec newspapers, the Fédération des journalistes professionelles du Québec, and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association urged judges to shield the identity of a source key to the reporting of the sponsorship scandal in Quebec.

If the client-lawyer relationship is privileged, why shouldn’t the journalist-source relationship be privileged too?

AdviceScene

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Comments

One Response to “Journalistic privilege”

  1. Mound of Sound on October 23rd, 2009 11:07 am

    By posing the question I assume you’ve never been a journalist. As a reporter I thoroughly distrusted lawyers. As a lawyer it was reporters I came to distrust. When I was asked to comment about a case and refused, I’d be asked why. When I said I’d been a reporter that was the end of the argument.

    Even when I was on the other side I thought reporter-source privilege was a bad idea. We have advanced press freedom in our countries without commensurate codes of responsibility.

    I trust very, very few reporters. Why would I want that horde to be afforded a privilege they’re not responsible enough to honour?

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