Let’s have more ‘criminals’

DURING more than 40 years of NUJ membership I’ve been privileged to know and work with a number of men and women whose integrity, commitment and sheer cussed determination to protect and improve the lot of journalists in the UK and Ireland have been a courageous example to all of us.

Perhaps one day Josephine Bacon (Letters last issue) will earn her place amongst those giants by working for her fellow NUJ members. But her letter attacking Eamonn McCann suggests an agenda that has little to do with defending the needs of journalists.

I’ve known Eamonn for most of the past 40 years. I’ve frequently disagreed with him, and hope to live long enough to prove him wrong on many issues. To call him infuriating would be pathetically inadequate.

But I believe Eamonn McCann is one of the most courageous trade unionists I have ever met, and I am proud and pleased that he is now a member of our union’s executive council.

When Ms Bacon comes to examine Eamonn McCann’s record in years to come I hope she’ll recognise that being a “convicted criminal” is the least of his attributes.

Eddie Barrett
London E17

Gobsmacked

I WAS gobsmacked by Josephine Bacon’s letter. Surely she can’t be suggesting that trashing computers is a crime but bombing children isn’t?

Isn’t her quarrel rather with the NUJ members who voted Eamonn McCann onto the union’s NEC? Or with the jury that threw out the charges against him? Surely not with the Journalist for reporting on the case.

Can anyone take seriously the knee-jerk accusation that criticism of the Israeli military makes you an anti-Semite?

The NUJ has a proud record of defending journalists whom the state has branded “criminals”. Eamonn and his comrades deserve our warmest congratulations. Moreover, they won their case with very little help from the media.

David Crouch
Chair, Media Workers Against the War

Dangerous argument

JOSEPHINE BACON misses the main objection to NEC members — or others — committing criminal damage for political aims.

The “lawful excuse” defence, as used by Greenpeace and others, is supposed to apply only when there is no alternative to breaking the law to prevent a greater harm.

In matters of public policy, democratic society does offer alternatives — albeit slow ones.

Would we allow the same defence to, say, a newspaper proprietor who hired thugs to smash up Headland House to stop the NUJ organising a picket? Or a fascist vigilante group convinced that immigration was leading the country to disaster?

Michael Cross
London N6