The PCC has an editors code of practice to consider when regulating print. The 16 points are as follows (according to their official website)
1. Accuracy
The Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information, including pictures
2. Opportunity to reply
A fair opportunity for reply to inaccuracies must be given when reasonable called for.
3. *Privacy
Everyone is entitled to respect for his or her private and family life, home, health and correspondence, including digital communications.
4. *Harassment
Journalists must not engage in intimidation, harassment or persistent pursuit.
5. Intrusion into grief and shock
In cases involving personal grief or shock, enquiries and approaches must be made with sympathy and discretion and publication handled sensitively. This should not restrict the right to report legal proceedings, such as inquests.
6. *Children
Young people should be free to complete their time at school without unnecessary intrusion.
7. *Children in sex cases
The press must not, even if legally free to do so, identify children under 16 who are victims or witnesses in cases involving sex offences.
8. *Hospitals
Journalists must identify themselves and obtain permission from a responsible executive before entering non-public areas of hospitals or similar institutions to pursue enquiries.
9. *Reporting of crime
Relatives or friends of persons convicted or accused of crime should not generally be identified without their consent, unless they are genuinely relevant to the story.
10. *Clandestine devices and subterfuge
The press must not seek to obtain or publish material acquired by using hidden cameras or clandestine listening devices; or by intercepting private or mobile telephone calls, messages or emails; or by the unauthorised removal of documents or photographs; or by accessing digitally-held private information without consent.
11. Victims of sexual assault
The press must not identify victims of sexual assault or publish material likely to contribute to such identification unless there is adequate justification and they are legally free to do so.
12. Discrimination
The press must avoid prejudicial or pejorative reference to an individual's race, colour, religion, gender, sexual orientation or to any physical or mental illness or disability.
13. Financial journalism
Even where the law does not prohibit it, journalists must not use for their own profit financial information they receive in advance of its general publication, nor should they pass such information to others.
14. Confidential sources
Journalists have a moral obligation to protect confidential sources of information.
15. Witness payments in criminal trials
No payment or offer of payment to a witness - or any person who may reasonably be expected to be called as a witness - should be made in any case once proceedings are active as defined by the Contempt of Court Act 1981.
This prohibition lasts until the suspect has been freed unconditionally by police without charge or bail or the proceedings are otherwise discontinued; or has entered a guilty plea to the court; or, in the event of a not guilty plea, the court has announced its verdict.
16. *Payment to criminals
Payment or offers of payment for stories, pictures or information, which seek to exploit a particular crime or to glorify or glamorise crime in general, must not be made directly or via agents to convicted or confessed criminals or to their associates - who may include family, friends and colleagues.
There may be exceptions to the clauses marked * where they can be demonstrate to be in the public interest.
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