Note this wise comment by Peter Preston in yesterday's Observer:
What does a union general secretary do when he's got members on both sides of a dispute? He plays dumb, or 'slightly bemused'. That's Jeremy Dear of the National Union of Journalists, implicitly siding with his BBC members rather than his regional press membership in the row over local Beeb ultra-local internet sites.
Can't see the problem, says Jeremy. The BBC doesn't take ads, does it? No, but it takes readers away from the local papers whose newsrooms supply much of BBC content. And when readers go, ads go. Surely Mr Dear can see the problem? If he can't, then his members on both sides have a problem, too.
I think I can see Dear's rationale. He is supporting a public service media institution rather than private profit-seeking companies. Why should he back employers who are making his members redundant week by week?
However, as he also knows, the journalists working within those companies stand to lose even more if their owners are squeezed even further by the encroachment of a competitor moving into their territory.
In the end, what this increasingly bitter dispute between the BBC and the regional press owners requires is high-level arbitration. The problem: who show be the arbitrator? Ofcom? The Office of Fair Trading? The competition commission? The government, through the department of culture, media and sport?
Whoever does the job, it must be done. The BBC and regional journalists now working on newspapers need each other. But if the BBC were to drive papers out of business there is no guarantee that the press journalists, who the broadcaster needs because of their local knowledge, will be able to survive financially.
In fact, in Barkis mode, let me say: "I'm willing".
