The European Union in the British National Press: a Questionable Objectivity

Volume 3 Issue 4 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND March 2017 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926

The European Union in the British national press: a questionable objectivity

Mohamed Elabed Tunisian Association of Young Researchers, Tunisia email: [email protected]

Abstract

The way the print media cover a given event in a particular state and during exceptional times makes it reasonable to revisit the notion of objectivity in relation to media discourse. The British press coverage of the Euro crisis may be a relevant case study to this, especially that different British newspapers tend to depict the European Union (EU) in a rather negative manner. However, The British media’s portrayal of the EU could not only be restricted to the benefits or the costs of the EU itself. Having this in mind, one may question the credibility of the rhetoric of such newspapers. The present paper seeks to study the extent to which the press is objective in dealing with the issue of the European Union particularly during the recent Euro crisis. Firstly, it gives a general overview of the British national press or the ‘London press’ placing emphasis on those newspapers1 which directly attack the EU. Secondly, it studies the way those newspapers depict the United Kingdom, the European Union, and the Euro-group. Thirdly, this paper directs attention to those newspapers which seem to be more objective than their counterparts, assuming that such objectivity could not mean an entire neutral stand. Keywords: Objectivity, European Union, United Kingdom, press, euro crisis.

1 The newspapers to be investigated here are: The Daily Express, The Sun, and The Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph and The Times. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 89

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Introduction Britain’s relationship to the European Union is not usually stable. Ever since Britain became a member of what was then the European Community in 1973, divergence between the United Kingdom and her European partners has characterised such relationship. Although it seems primarily a political issue, the UK-EU crisis is also a production of a varitey of other factors, perhaps the media are on the top list of them. There are several reasons for selecting newspaper articles rather than any other sort of media. First, it is likely that the British press offers daily thorough examinations about newly decided policies in the EU. Second, newspapers tend to adopt the most eurosceptic discourse among the British media. Third, selecting print media is amenable to the process of conducting discourse analysis which requires that all material collected be converted to the form of text (Taylor, 2001; Philips and Jorgenson, 2002). Finally and perhaps most importantly, the famous national newspapers still have a large number of readers, since surveys find that Britons buy more papers than any other Europeans.2 Existing scholarship of European studies have recently witnessed the emergence of a considerable amount of literature that mainly directs attention to the role of the media in general and the print media specifically in shaping the British political stand on the process of European integration. Carey and Burton (2004) find that newspaper coverage influences attitudes towards the EU where the information provided by newwspapers mirrors the opinion of political parties. Framing the European Union in terms of potential benefits is correlated with high levels of support to the EU (Vlegenthardt et al., 2008), while presenting the EU in terms of conflict is associated with cynicism and opposition to the EU (De Vreese, 2007; Vlegenthardt et al., 2008). Charles Grant (2008) finds that two quality newspapers The Daily Telegraph and The Daily Mail almost never printed an article supporting the EU. Schuck and De Vreese (2006) find that framing the EU policies in terms of risk rather than opportunity leads to lower levels of support and that those who lack knowledge about the EU are the most affected by such framing. Benjamin Hawkins (2012) assesses the role of the media in influencing the public opinion. He argues that there has been a consistent eurosceptic discourse within a number of influential newspapers. Hawkins states that “the clearest anti- EU sentiments are to be found in the British print media” (2012, 562). Reviewing the literature about the British press coverage of the European Union makes it apparent that almost all the studies have not dealt with such coverage in terms of objectivity. There are no clear clues that show that the previous studies took into consideration the extent to which such coverage is objective. Perhaps media, in general, and print media, in particular, are the one most striking field that provokes debate about the notion of objectivity. This study is an attempt to fill that gap. It follows a detailed analysis of five British online national newspapers -three tabloids namely The Daily Express, The Sun, and The Daily Mail and two right-wing press The Daily Telegraph, The Times3 -to argue that they all pretend to oppose the EU without being objective in so doing. This is going to be proved by the coverage of the Left Wing Press which seems to be pro-European to some extent. This study chooses to work on presenting the EU in a context of crisis that it faces. During the recent Euro crisis,4 the British

2 John Oakland, British Civilization : an Introduction, 5th ed (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), 216. 3 The Daily Telegraph, The Times and The Independent are considerd as ‘Quality’ dailies. 4 In 2008, the global financial crisis affected the European economy. Rising unemployment, falling growth rates, and soaring public deficit and debts are the most notably aspects of such a crisis. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 90

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eurosceptic discourse has increased and the discourse of the press tends to adopt a highly negative style of presentation. Although a significant body of literature has appeared in recent years to study the presentation of the EU, understanding this remains limited. It seems that such issue needs additive concern, particularly if one keeps in mind that this is not eventual and so not restricted to one event within the process of European integration as a whole. Therefore, this research directs attention to one of probably the most thorny issues within the UK-EU enduring debate, that of the single currency. Even before the break-out of the euro crisis, the British policy-makers strongly opposed membership of the Eurozone.5 The enduring finacial crisis in the Eurozone has increased the amount of scepticism not least among the British press, although Britain is not a member of the Eurozone. The present study is based on a content analysis of what is presented in the newspapers mentioned above. It thus attempts to facilitate understanding the ever controversial European issue in Britain. It employs the concept of objectivity to examine the extent to which the media rhetoric on the EU is credible. The fisrt part is devoted to giving a general overview of the British press, placing emphasis on those newspapers that are known for their hostility to the EU. The second part studies the manner the UK the EU, and the eurogroup are presented. The purpose here is mainly to identify the difference in presenting the three sides. It is not a contrastive study, however. Thirdly and most importantly, the present paper tries to direct attention to those newspapers which seem to be more neutral and so could be looked at as balanced to some extent. Methodology and Objectives Basically, one research method is employed here: content analysis. Such analysis focuses on press coverage of issues related to the EU with putting emphasis on the Eurozone issue. This paper concentrates mainly on the British national press. Thus, regional newspapers are not considered. Selecting national newspapers is adequate to this study. Firstly, national press headquarters are particularly based in London. This means that not in Cardiff or any other of the capitals of the states of the union.6 Secondly, national press has stronger impacts on the public regarding the popularity it has among readers. Thirdly and perhaps most importantly is that the national press has the highest circulation nation-wide. Content analysis allows this research to assess the extent to which the EU is coverd by each of the newspapers selected and so to identify the nature of this coverage whether it is partial or impartial. This method might help stress the credibilty of the coverage and question its objectivity. The analysis of the articles covers the period from 2010 to 2013, the period that witnessed the culmination of the euro crisis. This time frame was determined by a tendency to obtain data over a period in which the EU is in hardships and so scrutiny towards it has increased. Such period was characterised by the increase of euroscepticism among the newspapers studied.

5 The Eurozne is the area of Europe that consists of countries that are members of the European Union and use the euro as a unit of money. Currentluy there are 19 member states in the Eurozone after the access of Lithuania on January 1, 2015. 6 The Union here is the United Kingdom. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 91

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The British eurosceptic national press: overview. Among Britain’s main national newspapers, those which take a broadly eurosceptic line are The Daily Mail, The Daily Express, The Daily Telegraph, The Sun, and The Times. These newspapers tend to oppose further European integration and have called for ratification of the Lisbon Treaty to be subject to a referendum. In November 2010, The Daily Express became the first British newspaper to formally call for withdrawal from the EU. The Daily Telegraph and The Times are widely seen as belonging to the right-wing press (RWP). On the other hand, The Daily Express, The Sun, and The Daily Mail are widely considered tabloids. Besides, newspapers in the United Kingdom are commonly divided into two types: quality and popular newspapers. The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, and The Financial Times are quality newspapers. The Daily Mirror, The Daily Express, The Daily Star, and The Sun, on the other hand are popular newspapers. As far as orientation is concerned, the newspapers studied here represent the two major mainstream political tendencies in their editorial stand. The Sun corresponds to the Right, The Daily Telegraph to the Right, Conservative, The Daily Express to the Right, The Daily Mirror to the Left-wing popular, and The Independent to Centre-left. It is also crucial to this research to study party-support of each of these newspapers. This is in order to understand their political stand and thus their European position. The following table classifies poltical orientations of the newspapers studied and their party support during the run to the General Elections of 2015. Table 1. Newspaper’s Political Orientation and Party Supported (General Elections 2015).

Newspaper Political Orientation Party supported General Elections (2015) The Sun Right Conservative The Daily Telegraph Right Conservative The Daily Express Right UKIP The Daily Mail Right Conservative The Times Centre-right Conservative Source: British International Business, June 2015 (adapted). The British press seems to be affecting the public opinion towards the EU. Given the fact that a large part of the British people still use the press as their primary source for knowing about the world, it is important to question the validity of the discourse especially that that takes the EU as a subject of reporting. Given the fact that British press has higher rate of circulation compared to that of France, for example, it is of no less importance to examine the credibility of the discourse of such press about the EU. The British newspapers seem to be opposing British membership of the EU and turning the public opinion against the EU. The following table, which is adopted from The Guardian, shows the percentage of circulation of the five studied newspapers among other national dailies:

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Table 2. British Dailies’ Circulation, June 2013.

ABCs : National dailies, June 2013

% June 2013 January June June % May change (without 2013 – 2013 2012 change 2013 on last bulks) June 2013 year

The Sun 2,243,903 2,583,552 -13.15 2,269,238 2,243,903 2,288,486 -12.72 Daily 1,038,753 1,081,330 -3.94 1,01,289 1,017,042 1,040,728 -4.62 Mirror Daily Star 540,849 602,296 -10.20 534,813 540,849 535,178 -12.63 Daily 252,626 279,324 -9.56 255,238 250,711 254,747 -9.44 Record Daily Mail 1,806,569 1,939,635 -6.86 1,787,558 1,715,920 1,817,087 -7.24 Daily 522,264 602,482 -13.31 525,235 522,264 526,406 -9.47 Express Daily 547,106 573,674 -4.63 545,579 547,106 546,943 -5.49 Telegraph The Times 390,941 400,120 -2.29 394,982 372,234 395,571 -0.46 Financial 258,488 297,225 -13.03 256,655 229,819 266,193 -14.04 Times The 187,000 211,511 -11.59 192,376 187,000 193,916 -10.51 Guardian The 73,060 90,001 -18.82 75,089 54,838 75,034 -25.07 Independent Source: The Gaurdian, 12 July 2013. As the table shows, the newspapers which are studied here have a high daily circulation, which reflects the large number of readers they have, although the number differs from one paper to another. For instance, The Sun has the highest circulation with 2,288,486 newspapers per day. This makes it important to analyze these newspapers’ way of presenting the European Union, particularly because most UK citizens have got information about the EU from the press. Given the fact that the British print media is the first source for the public opinion to know about the EU, it is crucial to study the way the public think the press presents the EU. The

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following figure gives data about the perception of the British media in the period between 2007 and 2010: Figure 1. Perception of the British Media.

Source: “Attitudes towards the E U in the United Kingdom,” Flash Eurobarometer 318. March 2011. As the figure shows, 26 % of the respondents think that the press presents the European Union objectively. This is a considearble proportion that makes it important to study the objectivity of the press in reporting on the European Union. Althuogh this percentage reamined stable from 2007 to 2010, it can indicate that the British public is aware about the extent to which the print media is objective in its coverage of the EU. For this reason, the present paper aims at questioning the notion of objectivity in presenting the United Kingdom, the European Union and the Euro group. A text analysis is conducted here to find whether there is a link between the content and the reality. What follows is a study of the way each of the three sides is presented. Presentation and/or objectivity Presenting The United Kingdom. The content of the newspapers is partly tied to a certain environment be it political, economic, or social. This affects any given coverage. The fact that the majority of the British newspapers adopt sceptic voice towards the EU makes it difficult for those newspapers to escape the dominant negative voice. The context thus plays a major role in shaping the manner of coverage. In the context of the euro crisis the dallop of scepticism has increased and included even those newspapers traditionally considered pro- European. News production is not void of external circumstances. When journalists produce such kind of news, they may have in mind a number of tools they can use to influence their target audience. Perhaps the most important of these is the way to attract them. As a journalist from The Times puts it, ‘We think that the single currency is a bad idea for the UK. So because we have gone through an intense debate about the euro, this has probably created a

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negative perception regarding our coverage of the EU in general.’7 Such claim highly reveals that adopting a style in reporting on political issues is not neutral. In this regard, newspapers’ coverage might be influenced by the public in an indirect way. When print media owners feel that the public is hostile to a given topic, they invest on this. They even order their practitioners to adopt a style of reporting that adapts with the public general view. Journalism, thus, becomes a good business. The notion of impartiality is highly debatable here. It also could lead to bias. For these reasons, it is crucial to this study to analyse the way the United Kingdom, the European Union, and the Euro-group are presented. It is thus a kind of comparative study oriented towards contesting the objectivity of the text analysed.

The dominant image of Britain in the coverage of the Eurozone crisis in the British eurosceptic tabloids is that the United Kingdom is distinct from other Europeans. Britain is seen to be affected by the trouble in the Eurozone. Britain looks economically vulnerable and politically isolated. According to Vernon Bogdanor, Britain cannot attend the Eurozone institutions which have been developing since December 2011.8 The UK is excluded, yet she can survive by herself. Reporters depicted Britain to be an economic power that can set her own policies both of political and monetary issues. According to the The Telegraph Politics, June 7th 2012, Britain’s trade policy is within the Commonwealth, whose economy is about to overtake that of the Eurozone. It reports, ‘our recovery will begin on the day we rejoin the hinterland from which we have been artificially sundered.’ This reflects placing emphasis on Commenwealth partnership, particularly that the economy of the Commonwealth is continuing to prosper compared to that of the Eurozone.

The United Kingdom is seen as a targeted nation by the Franco-German axis inside the European Union/Euro-group framework. It is frequently found in the newspapers studied that measures and policies adopted are against the UK’s own interests. Correspondingly, those most eurosceptic voices argue that Britain is better off out than in. It is conceived that Britain should have a “trade only” relationship rather than political union with Europe.9 The Daily Mail from February 11th, 2011 headlined the ‘Day We Stood Up to Europe: In an unprecedented move MPs reject European court’s ruling that prisoners must get the vote.’ James Chapman, describes the MPs’ vote rejecting the European Court’s ruling that prisoners must get the right to vote as ‘a historic defence of Britain’s sovereign right to make its own laws.’ Virulent headlines putting Britain in a state of defence appear to be dominant in the eurosceptic press. Headlines might be seen as exagerated given that Britain is involved in a state of affairs in the EU in which the UK is an active participant. ‘The UK must stand up against Brussels’ writes The Telegraph 4 December 2011. This rhetoric places the United Kingdom in a state of confrontation with Brussells which represents

7 Cited in Antonio V. Memendez Alarcon, “ Media Presentation of the European Union: Comparing Newspaper Coverage in France, Spain, and the United Kingdom,” International Journal of Communication. Vol (4) 2010, 398-414. 8 Vernon Bogdanor, “ British Euroscepticism,” ‘Britain in Europe’ debate organized by the Friedrich-Ebert- Stiftung London Social Europe Journal, April 26, 2012, http://www.social-europe.eu/2012/04/british- euroscepticism/. 9 Martyn Brown, “Labour rebels unite with Tories to force vote on quitting EU,” The Daily Express, September 19,2011, http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/272313/Labour-rebels-unite-with-Tories-to-force-vote-on-quitting- EU. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 95

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the European Union here not Belguim. According to this discourse the European Union is in conflict with one of its member states. Another headline which shows the harsh voice adopted against the EU is that of the The Telegraph Business. The headline writes, ‘If the euro is saved then Britain should quit the EU and say good riddance.’ Whilst there is evidence here that the British press wants the euro to be saved, it is also clear from this discourse that EU membership is not favoured in essence. Britain here is put in a position of power in which she had to leave the EU would the euro be saved. ‘Let’s take back Britain's powers from the European Union, and let’s do it now,’ under this headline, David Davis writes an article in The Telegraph, 4 November 2011, to argue that the whole relationship with the EU should be renegotiated.The tone seems to be urging British politicians to save Britain from the EU. The duality of UK/EU as opponents seems to be dramatically subjective. Britain’s state of defence is meaningful here. The European Union has become an opponent against which the United Kingdom should preserve her interests. The very original role of the newspapers of informing the public about the EU is dubious here. Negative reporting seems to undermine the basic role of the news produced on the EU. The public perception of the EU will tend to be negative.10 It has become, thus, a crisis of discourse among those papers. This means that instead of taking the audience into an accessable information, the press concentrates more on dramatising the euro crisis. Presenting the European Union. The British eurosceptic press tends to depict the European Union in a negative manner. The EU is usually seen as a project created by France and Germany to undermine the British economy. An ever-closer Union is considered dangerous since it would be simply a union of governments not population. The United Kingdom is consigned as a peripheral member state with secondary influence in the policy-making of the Union. This is conceived as an intended marginalization of Britain. According to the Eurosceptic press, backed by France and Germany, European Commissioners will do all they can under the new Lisbon Treaty to force the UK to pay for their problems. Furthermore, a united states of Europe is seen as an illegitimate state without a nation. The EU’s institutions and policies are reported to be working against the British interests. The tri-partite coalition made up of ‘France,’ ‘Germany,’ and ‘Brussels’ is seen as an alliance to let Britain ‘out in the cold.’ Terms like ‘Europe’ and ‘Brussels’ are employed to refer to a bureaucratic EU from which the United Kingdom is excluded and ‘isolated on the sidelines.’ The terminology appears to be a useful tool to convey the messages of the press. What is striking in the articles selected is the harsh criticism towards the current state of affairs within the European Union. Regulations of the EU are seen to be ridiculous (The Telegraph Business, 18 December 2011). In fact, there are calls for rethinking the negotiation style with the EU. Writers of these articles have called for a new framework that should be introduced in the interrelation between the European Union and the United Kingdom as a leading member state rather than being led. In addition, there is a pervasive process of persuading readers, or, to put it more precisely, policy-makers, to adopt a new policy in dealing with their European partners or withdraw Britain completely from the Union. For instance, there are calls for deciding human right cases in London rather than in Luxemburg. This becomes clear in The Telegraph 17th November 2011. The Telegraph reports that, ‘we need to have human rights cases decided in London, not Luxembourg.’ Moreover, negative depictions of the EU and its institutional workload are privileging in the rhetoric of the

10 Alarcon, “Media Representation of the European Union,” 412. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 96

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eurosceptic press. Journalists tend to use bad images of the European Union as harmful and destructive to Britain.

Furthermore, the EU’s institutions are considered undemocratic institutions with which the United Kingdom has to change her relation. There seem to be complaints about the unelected commissioners who, according to The Telegraph propose laws, control the budget and enforce decisions and, therefore, hold real powers. This is seen as fundamentally undemocratic. It is also reported that the EU laws are unnecessary. The EU is seen as an occupying force. ‘The EU has already become a kind of occupying force, setting unfamiliar rules, demanding levies, curbing freedoms, subverting our culture, and imposing alien taxes.’ The Daily Express, September 19, 2011.

These images seem to be exaggerated, since, in spite of the EU interference in some domestic affairs, the United Kingdom remains the final decision-maker in such affairs. Thus it could be argued here that the coverage has shifted from producing news to the public into intervening in the game of playing politics. Stereotyping the EU is another way of influencing the public and by doing so impacting policy-makers. The media as a whole become a major player in shaping the process of policy-making in the European question in the United Kingdom. Since the European issue is usually considered a foreign issue in the UK, the press coverage treatment of the European Union appears to be hostile. Hostility, thus, creates stereotypes. This emanates mainly from the common dissatisfaction with all that comes from Europe as the ‘Other’ of Britain. There is evidence in separating the UK from the EU at the most basic linguistic level. The use of the prefix ‘un’ in three adjectives: ‘undemocratic,’ ‘unelected,’ and ‘unnecessary’ might be an assertive way in underlining the illegitimacy of the EU. In addition, there is common use of the prefix ‘anti’ in a number of the articles analysed. Terms like ‘anti-Brussels’ and ‘anti- European’ are used to describe opposing dictations coming from Brussels. The EU is also depicted as one single country from which the United Kingdom would be merely a province. This diction reflects a general tendency of the British eurosceptic press to push forward withdrawing the United Kingdom from the EU ‘altogether.’ In treating the European issue, the articles studied agree that the current state of the European Union does not work for the United Kingdom. Firstly, the idea of political union is undermining the British democracy. Secondly, the current intrusive regulations are seen to be subordinating to the British justice system. Last but not least, the rules of free movement are considered to be weakening to border controls. The press exploited the Euro crisis to raise its sceptic voice. They primarily want to dramatise the story of the euro crisis. Such tendency stems from the willingness of this press to be competitive among its European counterparts. Contesting the plot and dramatising it raise questions about the neutrality of the news produced. The concept of objectivity has a link to reality and truth. But the news reported may not be true. Presenting the Euro-group. The rhetoric of press tends to change according to the general atmosphere surrounding it. Coverage of a given event could receive much more talk and, therefore, attract a significant number of readers and observers. It is a fact that might be an evidence for questioning its objectivity. This could, in fact, be applied to the course of media

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coverage in the United Kingdom. In times of crisis, media might adopt a style of narrative that could be highly argumentative, or harshly critical. The Euro-group is seen as a lobby ruled by the Franco-German alliance. The British eurosceptic press depicts member states of the Eurozone as a group of countries dominating the European Union. The Eurozone is considered as a homogenous bloc. In addition, the monetary union is seen as a ‘political conceit from which Europeans are about to pay a devastating economic cost,’ The Telegraph, 31 May 2012. Within this framework the City of London is going to be damaged by Brussels’ proposals. It is argued that the Eurozone has been built on lies. While some newspapers predict the collapse of the euro and so the process of integration would suffer huge loss of prestige, others assume that the EU is already split between Eurozone and non-Eurozone group. The former would work for deeper integration, and the latter would not join the euro, reported The Telegraph, 17 Nov 2011. Further in dealing with the issue of the Eurozone, the eurosceptical press tends to blame Germany for the trouble in the Euro area. The Telegraph, 31 May 2012, claims that it would be Germany’s fault if the euro failed. The Eurogroup is conceived as a currency union that intended to bind the bloc together as The Telegraph February 2012 puts it. In addition, there is frequent use of ‘Franco-German currency’ instead of the ‘euro.’ This seems to be highly critical to the single currency and the Franco-German regulations made to save it. This explains the frustration in Number 10 and in the Treasury with the way in which the crisis has been managed by Germany, France and the European Central Bank. Some went ever further to predict the death of the euro whatever ‘Germany does.’ The collapse of the euro is also considered inevitable by The Economist which reported that ‘as investors and voters lose faith, the task of saving the single currency grows harder. Sooner or later the euro will be beyond saving.’11 According to The Daily Mail, May 3rd, 2013, it is Germany to be blamed for the eurozone crisis. It is Germany that accepted poor member states to the group and hence to lead the euro to its debt crisis. Accordingly, the European Central Bank is depicted as the ‘German taxpayer.’ Much blame has been put on Germany as the policy-maker of the Eurozone. The Telegraph reports that Germany would not care about the interest of the other members of the group. It wrote: ‘Yet, with record low unemployment and a still growing economy, Germany has adopted an “I’m all right, Jack, not our problem attitude.”’12 The press rhetoric seems to attack the German policies in the Eurozone, because many in the United Kingdom consider the single currency a German project to serve the German interests in Europe. This goes against the British interests. Arguably, such discourse remains mainly a result of clashed interests between the big member states of the European Union.

Furthermore, the sceptical press has adhered to the public voice to affect the political elite in the Whitehall. In November 2010, The Daily Express launched its ‘Get Britain Out’ campaign. Then, in September 2011, the same newspaper delivered a petition with 100000

11 “The European Union in Disaray: A comedy of euros,” The Economist, December 17, 2011, http://www.economist.com/node/21541840. 12 Jeremy Warner, “It’s not just the markets that have lost faith in the euro; previously compliant electorates are also close to breaking point,” The Telegraph, May 31, 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/9302784/The-euro-is-going-up-in-smoke-and-theres-no- fire-brigade-to-stop-it.html. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 98

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names demanding a referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU to 10 Downing Street. Likewise, the elites have used eurosceptic tabloids to send grievances to the government. 100 Tory MPs wrote to The Telegraph urging the government to exercise the opt-out in February 2012. The climax of the sceptic press heighted in considering that such crisis would lead to Britain’s exit from the EU. In this respect, The Daily Mail goes even further as to consider that the euro crisis might force Britain out of the EU. Under the headline, ‘Deepening Euro crisis could force Britain out of the EU forever, says leading investment bank,’ Hugo Duncan reports that ‘many analysts and businesses believe that Britain would benefit from leaving the EU and forging new partnerships with emerging countries in Asia, the Americas, and Africa.’13 It could be understood from this rhetoric that the press even offers alternatives to the EU membership.

The Europhile voice: how neutral? While it seems that adopting a negative way of covering the European Union in the British national press during the period of the Eurozone crisis is overspread among the British national press, it is not unreasonable to state that the EU is still seen as a source of prosperity and peace in the Continent. This is a fact that might undermine the overwhelming view dominating the Right Wing Press and might be a counter argument which provides that whether intended or not this rhetoric reflects another face ‘reality.’ Since reality is not double-faced the discourse adopted by each of the two wings reflects disagreement among the British print media on a sensitive issue in contemporary British politics and so this proves the validity of questioning the objectivity of the coverage. According to Peter J Anderson and Tony Weymouth (2014), ‘the advantages of the single currency have never been fully explained to the public by the British press.’14 This ensures that the eurosceptic press do not seem objective especially when it comes to the single currency and the crisis makes a good chance for the sceptic press to increase its criticism. Among the papers that appear to be more pro-European compared to its counterparts is The Independent which tends to claim that Britain’s future is with Europe.15 Such claims opens the way for questioning what the eurosceptic press writes.

The role of the media in general and the national press in Britain when covering the euro crisis has always been under scrutiny for not being objective in informing the public about what is really going in the European Union as a whole not just in the Eurozone. The Left Wing Press, which generally seem to be less critical about the European Union, has adopted a different style of coverage in which the EU appears to be positively presented. According to Anderson and Weymouth(2014), the pro-European discourse is also tempted with scepticism. This kind of ambivalent discourse may reflect the lack of objective coverage especially if one considers this as a way of following a rather wise path of coverage particularly when it comes to European issues in general. In short, the Left Wing Press which is generally associated with The Independent, The Guardian, and The Financial Times sounds more realistic. This, however, does not mean an entire neutral stand. Thus, its objectivity is also questionable.

13 Hugo Duncan, “Deepening Euro crisis could force Britain out of the EU forever, says leading investment bank,” The Daily Mail, 10 August 2012, http://www.dailymail.uk.co/news/article-2186271/ Deepening-Euro- crisis-force-Britain-EU-says-leading-investment-bank.html#ixzz2ktskCVzT. 14 Peter, J Anderson,. and Anthony Weymouth, Insulting The Public? The British Press and The European Union, (NewYork: Routledge, 2014), 93.

15 J Anderson and Weymouth, Insulting The Public?, 95. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 99

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While the strongest position of the eurosceptic discourse is to be found in the right wing tabloids, it can appear also in the left wing Europhile press like The Guardian. This penetration of the euroscepttic discourse in papers broadly seen as supportive to integration means ‘the predominance of the Eurosceptic discourse in the British print media’ as Benjamin Hawkins (2012, 573) puts it. It is important at the end to refer to the ownership of the British press particularly to those newspapers that embody a eurosceptic rhetoric. Some of the anti- euro papers are owned by the Australian-American taycoon Rupert Mardoch including The Times and The Sun, two of the best selling British newspapers. This might also refer to ideology that cannot be separated from the whole atmosephere of reporting. This paves the way for questioning the validity of the eurosceptic stance.

Conclusion

This paper has explored the notion of objectivity in relation to the British national press coverage of the European Union during the recent Euro crisis. It has shown that the press in the United Kingdom has adopted a hostile discourse towards the process of European integration. This sense echoes the unappeased relation between Britain and the European Union in its current form. The euro crisis created some kind of two opposed blocs within the EU: the Euro-group, under the leadership of Germany, has dominated the affairs of the EU regarding the number of summits and conferences held in more than one European capital, something that represents a huge burden to the United Kingdom, though not part of the euro area, and the non-Euro group under the leadership of the UK. The eurosceptic press, while expressing dislike for the current status, has appealed to the British citizens to urge the elite to launch an in-out referendum Bill.

In addition, those press officials in Brussels who hold such kind of discourse towards Europe are not all of British origins. Those who write for the newspapers studied here are not all journalists. Economic analysts, professors and other experts are participants in the coverage. This highlights the fact that such coverage is controversial and open to different interpretations. These factors together support the view that the British press while it offers thorough examination of the European issue that could help the public in finding more about the process of European integration as a whole, it seems to deviate from its expected role of reporting on stories. Thus, this paper concludes that objectivity in relation to press coverage remains distant from being factual. The question to be considered here is what if the EU had its own press that would talk on its behalf. Would the EU journalists produce a counter- doscourse that stand to the attacks of the British press? Although answers to shuch quetsions could not be confirmed for the time being, signs of British press/ EU institutions divergence are likely to continue dominating the coverage particulalry if one takes into consideration the recent developments in the relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union in which demands of withdrawing Britain altogether from the organization have become highly represented.

Worth of note is the fact that most of the tabloids do not have representation in Brussels and other European capitals. This is a fact that puts covering the European issue under scrutiny. Stories on Europe that are written in London would not be sufficient in offering a clear-cut vision about the European Union. Furthermore, thanks to the new media

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and new styles of reporting the presentation may lack plausibility and so its reliability might be highly contested.

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