I can stand losing games. Even nine of them. It’s the good goals, the sharp tackles, the strength in adversity that I remember. Being robbed by bad referees, luck opponents, even beach balls has it’s own romanticism.

I can stand having bad years – we all do – and progress isn’t ever linear. As long as there’s some chink of light. Back in the early 1990s it was the emergence of Robbie Fowler. Pre Rafa it was Steven Gerrard carrying the team – a super-human effort that yielded more than we deserved.

Any even in bad years there’s always the cup competitions. You don’t need to win the cup necessarily, just win some high profile games in auspicious circumstances and have a memorable trip as a fan or a buzzing Anfield night under lights.

This year there’s been nothing. The good wins (Manchester United and Spurs at home) have only ever felt like a comma in a harrowing read. Great players haven’t performed and squad players have been diminished to mice. Recoveries from injury have only been accompanied by more injuries. The end of a tough run of games has been met only by slip-ups in 3 point bankers (eg. Wigan away).

And at the end of this 10 month torture of pulling nails against a blackboard, pre-season will see other sides spend lots of money as we struggle to not get weaker. And all the time supposed Liverpool ’supporters’ will churn out the views of media pundits who support other teams an enjoy the ratings uplift from any article that criticises LFC.

All around me I see Arsenal fans who know that they are not good enough ad likely to fall short at the end of the season. But even after five barren years they get close enough to still have hope. How I envy them now.

It doesn’t take much to give me hope. I’d rather believe in the tiny glimmers than require a mountain of hard fact for the scales of cynicism to fall from my eyes. But we’re dangling off a cliff with nothing to hold on to. At least if we’re knocked out of the cup this week, we won’t have to endure another couple of games.

So thanks for asking how I feel this morning. You didn’t really want to know, did you?

Related posts:

1. LFC half season review 2009-10: Livin on a prayer
2. Liverpool FC Reserves: season preview
3. Liverpool v Wolves FA Youth Cup analysis

He believes that newspapers “have weakened self-regulation by under-resourcing it”. Like the select committee and Nick Davies, Whittam Smith is critical of the lack of involvement of ordinary journalists in the Press Complaints Commission. Mr Whittam Smith also believes that the PCC’s remedy is not used correctly. He takes aim at the prominence of adjudications:

“To make an editor print an apology in exactly the same position and with exactly the same weight as the offending article would, I know from how I used to feel when the subject came up, cause almost unbearable anguish. The humiliation of it!”

But Whittam Smith is misleading on some aspects of reform of press self-regulation. He opposes fines, which is a reasonable position, but marshalls misleading language for his argument. Whittam Smith writes that “with money at risk, newspapers would want to be represented by lawyers at hearings”. This is undoubtedly true but obscures the fact newspaper’s legal teams already deal with the PCC.

Whittam Smith believes that fines would be unfair because some newspapers are wealthy and some are less so. But if you don’t pay for a TV licence the fine is not altered according to your personal wealth. The Media Standards Trust argues for a different principle: that the fine should be different according to the seriousness of the offence, rather than the wealth of the offender.

He also argues that fines would require statutory regulation because some newspapers would refuse to pay. That’s not the case. As the Media Standards Trust’s submission to the PCC’s governance review made clear, there are other bodies which fine their members without statutory backing. The newspaper would be bound by the terms of the contract of membership to pay the fine. If they refuse, they have breached that contract. They would always be free, though, to leave the PCC. But that’s the essence of self-regulation.

Andreas Whittam Smith is wrong on two fundamental issues. Firstly, he sees the principle of self-regulation as analgous to a City private members club, where the incentive is that one is reluctant to be dismissed. That hasn’t worked for the City and that’s not sufficient incentive for the modern newspaper industry that’s competing for readers globally and is facing economic pressures from amateur journalism. Self-regulation must become a badge of honour, a competitive edge; a set of standards which gives readers (the customer) something to know that they can value what they read.

Secondly, he writes of the relationship of a newspaper with its readers as follows:

“Newspaper editors don’t have a lot of time for what lay people may think of their methods”

If he is right, perhaps Mr Whittam Smith has highlighted why newspaper readership has collapsed and newspaper groups aren’t confident that if they charged for their work anyone would pay. Perhaps newspapers need to be run by people who care more about their customers, what their customers think of their product and can make a persuasive case for claiming special privileges for their work.

Related posts:

1. PCC adjudication against Scottish News of the World inconsistent and a threat to press freedom
2. Well done, Press Complaints Commission
3. Press Complaints Commission’s farcical investigation of Keith Vaz affair

However, the PCC now faces a huge challenge to rebuild public confidence in a judgement that is likely to be unpopular and misunderstood. It’s not the PCC’s fault that it received more complaints about that article than it had received over the previous five years. But many of those who complained will be dissatisfied by the process. And this case does pose challenges for the PCC to address, partly through its governance review.

The Editors Code itself needs further thought. That newspapers are free to offend should be beyond doubt. But the code allows discrimination against groups rather than individuals. This is out of step with the law, the definition of racism post-Macpherson, and societal norms. It’s also a bit silly. The code’s distinction is equivalent to allowing me to write ‘all newspaper editors are liars’, or ‘all Daily Mail journalists are homophobic’ as long as I don’t single out individual journalists.

The process by which the code can be amended has been opened up in recent years but still lacks transparency, independence and accountability. By enabling the public in to the process, the code committee recognises the importance of the code in instilling public confidence in the standards of journalism – surely a vital part of any economic recovery for the sector. But no member of the public can sit on the committee, the consultation takes place in secret and the rationale for revisions is not made clear. Until last week, the PCC still distributed the press releases for this apparently independent body.

The PCC’s lack of clarity on who is an eligible complainant meant – in this case – that it required a complaint from the grieving Andrew Cowles – for the investigation to proceed. Otherwise the complaints of 25,000 others may have been rejected. One can only imagine how the Daily Mail would have reacted if complaints by its readers about Celebrity Big Brother had been rejected because they weren’t Shilpa Shetty.

The PCC’s decision-making processes also require reform. It’s odd that we don’t know which members of the commission were present to consider the Jan Moir complaint. We’re told that despite being a member of the commission, the Mail on Sunday editor wasn’t involved in the decision. The PCC said:

“This is in line with the PCC’s normal procedures when a title edited by a Commission member is subject to a PCC complaint.”

For the avoidance of doubt, the editor of the Mail on Sunday is not the editor of the Daily Mail. Should we therefore conclude that the PCC’s normal procedures mean that the editor of the News of the World is not involved in complaints against the Sun? And with no formal minutes published, how could we find out?

With a commission that meets in secret we don’t even know when the decision was made, let alone what case was made in the prosecution or defence. The PCC argues that one of it’s benefits is that it avoids the costs of lawyers. But we may never know if Andrew Cowle’s complaint (made through a team of solicitors) was challenged by the Daily Mail’s lawyers.

We don’t know how much the Daily Mail pays for the PCC (the funding is passed through intermediaries) or whether the PCC has sufficient resource to run a system which attracts this volume of public concern.

Baroness Buscombe was brave – and right – to come out and defend the decision in other media. And hearing her defence may go some way to instilling confidence in the judgement. But I was concerned by her argument that the context of the piece was important, particularly that it had appeared in page 37. It did, of course, but there was also a banner on the frontpage drawing attention to the article. So what if the case had gone the other way? Would a ruling four months after the event have made an impact? Would an apology on page 37 – or in Moir’s column – been enough?

The PCC’s governance review – although tightly defined – is the opportunity to address these issues. Unfortunately, the submissions it has received are still awaiting publication. If this opportunity for reform is missed, confidence in self-regulation of the press will be diminished.

Related posts:

1. Why Jan Moir and the Daily Mail will escape disciplinary action
2. Why Jan Moir’s apology shouldn’t be ‘case closed’
3. What should the PCC do about the Sunday World front page suicide photo?

The leaflet was branded Hackney News with a red masthead, masquerading as a Labour newsletter. Which is interesting because the last Lib Dem News I saw was in Birkdale where they are fighting the Tories. That leaflet was made to look like a Tory leaflet. Why are they embarrassed about being Liberal Democrats?

The Lib Dem leaflet didn’t make any reference to any of their accomplishments on Hackney council. As the third largest party on the council, that’s surprising. Why don’t they want to be open about that? But perhaps it’s a leaflet focussed on the parliamentary election. So why no reference to Nick Clegg? That’s a shame because I’ve always wondered what he looks like.

The newsletter was informative: it said that the Liberal Democrats have made “four top commitments in their manifesto”. Leaving aside the absurdity of anyone having four top priorities, one of them was “clean, open politics”.

I read the leaflet in detail to discover what they meant by “clean, open politics”. Given that the Lib Dems might hold the balance of power in the next parliament, it’s a critical issue. Will they reveal who they would form a coalition government with? No, not that open.

There’s an article on the second page attacking the bus fare rises in London, quite rightly. The text clearly says “The Mayor of London (Blond Bombshell Boris they call him – ingenious) is responsible for these fare increases.” Odd then, that the accompanying photo sees the  Lib Dem candidates posing with a banner reading “Labour and Tory bus fare increases”. “Honesty and integrity should be a given” writes candidate Keith Angus. Presumably not when there’s an election to be won.

The backpage (alas, there are only four pages) declares that the Liberal Democrats have been campaigning for action on regeneration in Woodberry Down “but so far with little success”. That doesn’t inspire me with much confidence in their effectiveness. Apparently the campaign involved writing an EDM for Diane Abbott MP to table in parliament. “Unfortunately the MP didn’t raise it in parliament, as I’d hoped” says Mr Angus, who clearly does not understand the pointlessness of EDMs nor that they don’t really involve raising an issue in parliament. Because, of course, if he did know that, he wasn’t being open and clean with us.

Finally, there’s a cut out and reply slip at the end of the leaflet inviting you to support the Lib Dems, display a poster (which presumably isn’t red) and join the party by accident if you donate more than £9 (yes, seriously). Only unfortunately the leaflet provides no indication of what they will do with your personal data. Neither clean (it’s against the Data Protection Act) nor honest.

Unfortunately, Mr Angus was  honest on one point: “One of my guilty pleasures is to watch Come Dine With Me on TV while eating chocolate spread, straight from the jar”. That may be honest, but it isn’t clean.

So again, I ask: what do the Liberal Democrats have to hide?

I do believe that the Lib Dems have a useful and important role to play in British politics. But when they behave like this, with low calibre people, it’s a difficult position to defend.

Related posts:

1. The Christian Party: lying or misleading?
2. Defending my political opponents

The price was a matter of concern to many Liverpool fans. Apparently £100,000 is chicken-feed for such a promising youngster. He did only have 18 months left on his contract and he was picked up on a free transfer. But supporters on forums did not believe that it was value for money, a meaningful contribution to the player budget (even at the Academy) or have confidence that the administrators (still with a small a) would have the expertise to demand performance bonuses if he went on to be a successful adult.

Others saw it as further evidence that Rafa Benitez was wrong to conduct the extensive overhaul of academy staff last summer. They examined the role of Malcolm Elias who was the scout of young talent we had poached from Southampton but has now moved to Fulham. This view was reinforced by rumours (which just won’t go away in Sky Sports parlance) linking striking hotshot Lauri Dalla Valle with a move in the same direction – a transfer for David Amoo was later added in the mix.

For an even more select few it was evidence that Liverpool is failing to nurture promising young players. For them, Dani Pacheco should have been in the first team squad ahead of players like Voronin and Buchtmann should have had more of a chance at reserve team level, after his promotion to Melwood on the summer. Some point to him playing on the right side of midfield for much of this year and conclude that he must have been mis-treated.

Thankfully in this case it could not be used as evidence of the managers blind faith in foreign talent over local lads. The player keeping him out of the reserve team was scouser Robbie Threlfall.

For another group it was proof that there are disciplinary problems at the Academy. They point to the early departure of fellow German Marvin Pourie – who appears to have fallen put with subsequent coaches – and presume Buchtmann must have been on the ale or just showing a lack of determination.

Rumours will always spread around a football community and Liverpool is a fertile city for gossip. But the presumption that there was an intriguing story behind the move reveals much about supporters confidence in the running of the club and the unchallenged rumours of yester year.

These are the same supporters who’ve read (unchallenged) reports that Nathan Eccleston was going to move to Blackburn after being promoted to Melwood only to be sent back to the Academy because the first team base was ‘full’. Rumours also suggested we lost centreback Robert Huth last year because no-one remembered to renew his contract. And we heard of splits in the dressing room and amongst the coaches which demoralised young players.

Appointing Kenny Dalglish to oversee the Academy and taking personal responsibility for the operation may have been a smart move by Rafa but it’s not enough to give fans confidence.

Football, particularly at this level is still an opaque world, where fans see a few YouTube clips, four of five youth cup games and suddenly know the quality of a player. Where the myriad of associates (family members of the 100+ players associated with the young sides) mean that many more people might be ‘in the know’ and where simple explanations are discarded in favour of incompetece and scandal.

What if Christopher Buchtmann just fancied a bit of extra money? Perhaps that’s what brought him here in the first place. Maybe managemet has more confidence in Threlfall and Mavinga and knew his opportunities would be limited. Maybe, as a short-ish full back who’s not much younger than Insua, he didn’t fancy the challenge. And maybe he wasn’t best pleased at having to develop his right peg. Or maybe it’s all the agent / girlfriend / national team’s fault.

But the story reveals important parts of modern football: that £100,000 profit on a teenager is assumed to be bad business; there’s that much interest in an under-18 player who has never played 2 full games at reserve team level. That a little transparency is not enough; if fans don’t know the facts they fill in the gaps.

Related posts:

1. Liverpool v Wolves FA Youth Cup analysis
2. Focus on Nathan Eccleston
3. Daniel Pacheco’s five challenges