Maxwell, The Outsider

by Tom Bower

  Maxwell chose a different style. At midday, on 13 July, he summoned the Mirror's union leaders, the Fathers of the Chapel, to a meeting in the Rotunda, on the third floor. His speech started jovially. After explaining that he wanted to restore the Mirror to 'its former glory', he admitted that his ambition was to topple Murdoch's Sun as Britain's 'Number One Paper' and earn the same high profits which News International, owner of the Sun, was reaping - £23 million as opposed to the Daily Mirror's £1.6 million. It need an extra million sales, and while there would be no compulsory redundancies he would be negotiating a reduction of printers with the unions. He added that he would also be launching a London evening newspaper 'in the autumn' arid would want to introduce colour.

  The atmosphere began to turn sour soon after his introduction. Referring to the rumours that some printers had considered stopping the previous night's production in protest at his takeover, he said in a soft but deliberately menacing tone: 'If you would have stopped the paper, it would have stayed shut and if you don't believe me, ask the people at Park Royal.' As the audience became sullen, Maxwell began using swear words, but, after protests, apologised. 'Do you think that I am on an ego-trip?'

  'Yes,' shouted the audience in near-unison.

  ‘I have invested £90 million in this business and I don't belong to the Salvation Army. ... I am the proprietor. I am the boss. And I want that to be understood very clearly. There can only be one boss and that is me.' It was an honest riposte. For £90 million, he was entitled to create a profit-making business by removing those managers who had so badly failed and simultaneously to indulge himself, if he cared to do so.

  Only four people applauded as he sat down. Many were too fearful to move. Later that day, the same four provided the only votes against a motion condemning Reed for breaking its promise and insisting that Maxwell adhere to his guarantees of non-interference in editorial content. Maxwell had in the meantime dictated the following day's front page, a bold statement to the readers. 'The Mirror Group newspapers have changed ownership,' it read. 'Their policies will not change. I am proud to be the proprietor of this group of publications.' (One week later, after urgent calls from his lawyers, he angrily denied that he was the proprietor of the group, and insisted that he was only the publisher.)

  That afternoon, Maxwell held a press conference. His carefully phrased statement was a pledge of intent, repeating the very assurances which he had given to both Jarratt and Foot and, more importantly, to his senior editors and staff:

  I am very proud to be associated with Mirror Group Newspapers. ... It is my intention to restore the Daily Mirror to its rightful place as Britain's biggest-circulation popular newspaper without sacrificing any of its influence or tone. ... I shall ensure that the Mirror Group becomes more efficient and more competitive and more attractive and exciting so that it can attract readers from other tabloids which seem to me to pursue policies which are against the best interest of many, many millions of our citizens in these islands. Under my management, editors in the group will be free to produce their newspapers without interference, with their journalistic skills and judgement.

  I shall place only two strictures on those who have editorial responsibility for newspapers that are members of the Mirror Group. One, the papers must retain their broadly sympathetic approach to the labour movement. . . . Two, the papers must and will have a 'Britain first' policy. I want them to inform Britain, entertain Britain and boost Britain. Morale in Britain is low at present, but there is much in our country that is good and I want that to find a voice in the Mirror Group papers, on an even better and larger scale than is the case at present. We can and must revive our fortunes for our own sake and for our young people, so many of whom are being thrown on the scrapheap before they've even begun to live their lives.

  His critics readily noted his promises in order to compare them with his performance over the following twelve months. The comparison would, they felt, reveal a lot about Maxwell's attitudes, his character and above all his veracity. Although he had successfully compartmentalised his activities, his behaviour at the Daily Mirror would determine whether the allegations and criticisms about his business career were valid or whether he had, as he claimed, been unfairly maligned. The commercial world is complicated and shadowy, and Maxwell, like all other entrepreneurs, operated within a ghetto. Whatever had been revealed was a mere glimpse compared to what remained hidden behind the walls. In sharp contrast, at the Mirror, all his performances would be witnessed by professionals whose only motive when something of interest occurs is to publicise the deed as quickly as possible. Inside the Mirror building, Maxwell had established his own ground rules by which he could be judged. Intentionally, he exposed himself more than any other present-day publisher. He had forsaken the ghetto for a goldfish bowl and could be held to account by his critics without redress against accusations of distortion.

  On Sunday morning, Joe Haines arrived at his desk to begin collecting his belongings. Like most Mirror staff, he had heard the news of the take-over on Friday's early-morning news. His forceful speech against Maxwell at the union meeting had undoubtedly been reported to the new proprietor. He had meant every word he had uttered. Maxwell was unfit to own the newspaper and much worse. The day previously, he had told a friend, 'I'll be cashing in my railcard on Monday morning.' Minutes later his telephone rang. It was Maxwell. 'Joe, come up please.' Haines expected to be dismissed and told his trusting colleagues later, 1 didn't want to work for Maxwell.' But Maxwell had decided that he needed Haines. He had not calculated how long he needed his talents, but it was wise to juggle the options and forestall any headline about hacks leaving the sinking ship. Pinpointing an enemy's price and winning his sympathy lies at the heart of Maxwell's technique, and to Haines's surprise, he was offered promotion and a glowing future. If Haines was torn, his dilemma was soon resolved; he agreed to stay on two conditions: a guarantee of non-interference with his work and a promise that the Mirror would continue to support the Labour Party. 'What could I do?' he asked his colleagues dejectedly when he explained his acceptance, but it did not stop one observer rattling some coins as he walked past. Another of the Mirror's star columnists who expected dismissal was the investigative reporter Paul Foot. To his surprise, after he had insisted that he would stay only if he could write without interference, Maxwell agreed to his terms.

  A third who was offered similar conditions was Geoffrey Goodman. Maxwell asked him to 'help me revive the Mirror and join my Politburo to steer the paper', and promised that there would be 'no interference in your writing'.

  For Haines, Foot and Goodman, those guarantees were vital to their self-respect. All three also believed that the Mirror's readers, to whom they felt a responsibility, would cease buying the paper if, instead of proper reporting, they read the proprietor's opinionated articles. But they were the exceptions. Few of their senior colleagues stipulated similar conditions for remaining.

  The day following the take-over, Maxwell wrote a front-page article re-explaining his policies and aspirations. It was forceful and pungent. Within two weeks it was clear that, as many suspected, his self-introduction was not an isolated appearance.

  July was the fourth month of the miners' strike, which many already suspected was no longer an industrial dispute but had evolved into a clear-cut political battle between the Prime Minister and the miners' leader, Arthur Scargill. Many Conservatives believed that Scargill was intent on repeating his 1974 victory over Edward Heath. In their view, the very survival of both the government and the nation was at stake and the compromises which were customarily engineered to settle strikes should be ignored. Their priority was finally and utterly to rout the miners and deal the trade unions' hegemony a mortal blow.

  The Mirror was in an awkward predicament. Normally, it would be sympathetic to the miners but, like the Labour Party leadership, the newspapers' editors and senior staff were disturbed by Scargill's extremism, by the violence around the pits, and most of all by the un
ion's refusal to ballot its members. Nevertheless, many socialists felt that the government had deliberately cut off any chances of negotiation and that the long-term damage caused to the Labour movement would be grave.

  One of the Mirror's voices on these issues was their well-informed and distinguished industrial editor Geoffrey Goodman. Goodman was politically left-wing and had often found himself, during more than 30 years on the staff, in opposition to the newspaper's editorials especially about the common market, unilateral disarmament and governments' economic policies. On several occasions, the disagreements had ended in emotional rows. On 26 July, Goodman wrote a column about the strike entitled 'Digging into a Vendetta'. Writing in the Mirror's colloquial style, Goodman alleged that during the miners' strike in 1974, Margaret Thatcher had been, with one other, a lone voice in the Heath Cabinet urging her Prime Minister to Take on the miners, fight 'em to a finish and win. . . .' The present strike, claimed Goodman, was the delayed 'vast political test of will and strength' which the present Prime Minister had urged one decade earlier. In the emotion generated by the strike it was a distinctly anti-government story.

  That night, Goodman left his office believing that the article would work its way through the editorial machine and appear the following day. Instead, in his absence, Maxwell seized his piece, personally crossed out all references to a 'vendetta' and headed the revised and now rather confused column, 'The Enemy Within'. As the rumours of Maxwell's interference, executed without consulting Goodman, spread through the Mirror building during the morning of 27 July, the reality of Lex Maxwelliana dawned and questions began to be asked: Had Goodman protested? Had Joe Haines, promoted to assistant editor, raged? Had the editor Mike Molloy himself threatened to resign in defence of his staff? In fact, none of these had happened.

  Goodman had been telephoned at 11 p.m. and told about Maxwell's changes. Minutes later he had threatened Molloy that he would resign if his own article were not resuscitated but he was persuaded to wait until the morning. When he met Maxwell at 10 a.m., the proprietor 'put his arms around me and said, "How can you ever forgive me for such a thing? I should never have done it.'" Goodman did forgive his employer, agreeing that in future he would send his articles in advance to Maxwell to read, and the proprietor insisted, ‘I promise that I won't interfere.' The proprietor had struck and, despite the overwhelming might which the opposition could have brought to bear against him, he encountered only appeasement. ‘I fooled myself, says

  Goodman, 'that he'd keep to his promise.' Maxwell, many would discover, respected only those who resisted his cajolery.

  That same morning, after settling the local difficulty, Maxwell summoned his senior staff and enthusiastically outlined his next foray. There would be a special issue three days later about the strike. Goodman was detailed to arrange a secret meeting between Maxwell and Scargill at the Hallam Tower Hotel outside Sheffield. When they met, Goodman observed, the two 'got on very well together. They were practically interchangeable. Maxwell was very impressed by Scargill and especially by his complaints about police violence.' Yet, as the special issue was being prepared, Maxwell's animosity towards the miners seemed to wax. An opinion piece was commissioned whose line was to be critical of the miners. Reluctantly, Goodman and Terry Lancaster wrote the article for Maxwell's approval but refused to allow their names to be printed above it. Since Maxwell demurred placing his own name as the by-line, Molloy suggested that they use the alias 'Charles Wilberforce', which had previously been used by Cudlipp. Maxwell was satisfied and particularly approved the splash headline: 'The Pigheaded Identical Twins'. The journalists left his office dejected. 'We had become accomplices to his destruction of editorial independence,' says Goodman. In the lift going down from Maxwell's office, he confessed his fears to Molloy. 'There's no point going on, Mike,' he said.

  'Let's fight it out. Don't hand it over to him,' replied Molloy, who was afraid that any opposition would be greeted by dismissal. 'It's his paper.'

  Molloy's pragmatism was born of long experience. In his view the ritualistic worship of editorial independence was a myth, especially on the Mirror, because he could well recall how both King and Cudlipp would constantly interfere. If Goodman did not like the new owner, he had the simple but effective option of resigning.

  Seated in his ninth-floor office, Maxwell warmed to the notion that he, using the Mirror as a platform, could solve the strike. Among those who were summoned to serve that purpose was David Seymour, the newspaper's second-ranking leader writer beneath Joe Haines. Seymour is a committed and professional journalist of the sort which newspapers need if they are to innovate and thrive. During his thirteen years with the Mirror, Seymour had earned a reputation for writing 'Mirror Comment' pieces which evoked the spirit of both the newspaper and its readers. Seymour had been surprised when Maxwell, soon after his arrival, had asked to see his 'Comment' pieces and had begun changing occasional words. Since none of his superiors objected, he was left with no alternative but to wait most days with crowds of other journalists in the ante-room to Maxwell's office to submit his articles.

  ‘I want you to use all your Jewish chutzpah to write the following . . .' would often be the introduction to the proprietor's command. The editor Mike Molloy was rarely by Maxwell's side. Over the next weeks, Seymour regularly wrote the 'Mirror Comment' about the strike, consciously distorting what he felt to be the truth to suit Maxwell's views. 'The whole strike became a blur for me,' he recalls, 'because I was being battered the whole time by Maxwell, who was jumping up and down on my head telling me what was happening, which I knew was wrong.' Regularly, Seymour sat in Maxwell's office, negotiating the following day's 'Comment' amid constant telephone calls to the proprietor from stockbrokers, property dealers, the manager of Oxford United football club, other City tycoons and an endless stream of unidentifiable foreigners to whom Maxwell spoke in one of his eight languages. All these conversations about take-over deals, transfers of soccer players and currency movements, a testament to an unusually agile mind, took place while Seymour sat worrying about the advancing deadline, watching Jean Baddeley scurrying in and out of the office to feed the revised copy into the Wang computer, and pondering with others about the consequences for the newspaper's reputation.

  For the Mirror men who had prided themselves on their accuracy about industrial matters, the opprobrium they were gradually receiving from their readers was disquieting. The process reached a zenith on 10 September. The Mirror's headline was dramatic: 'Scargill to Ballot Members on Final Offer'. The report explained that the miners would be allowed to vote on the coal board's final offer. Alongside the article was an anonymous 'Comment' entitled 'A Vote For Sanity'. The story, which followed strenuous efforts by Maxwell to act as a peacemaker, was untrue. For the Mirror to publish an error on such a major issue further undermined the newspaper's credibility.

  Maxwell was unperturbed. At both the TUC and Labour Party conferences, as the Mirror's proprietor he had become the centre of attention, wielding the political power which he had sought for so long. According to Seymour, 'He just didn't seem to care that we were wrong.' He was also unconcerned about contradicting the assurances he had given at the 14 July press conference when he was asked how he could achieve the editorial changes without interference. His reply had been, '(a) I haven't got the time and (b) if you've got the talent of the kind that we have on these newspapers, what the hell are you going to do - tell them how to do their job? Come off it.' That statement was, he later said, a 'guarantee of editorial integrity' because the editors were not 'just a bunch of lackies and zombies [who] will do what I bid them'.

  Days after making that statement, Maxwell was filmed by BBC Television inside the Mirror building asking why a photographer was being sent to a James Bond set - why couldn't the film's producers provide a photograph free?; telling Peter Thompson, the Sunday Mirror editor, that he would not tolerate the newspaper following Liz Taylor to Richard Burton's grave, and later explaining, 'I refused to allow any
of our photographers or reporters to go and invade [her] privacy'; and declaring that he was 'shocked' by the Press Council's condoning the Sunday Times's exposure of suspicious transactions as evidenced by Denis Thatcher's bank accounts. There was, said Maxwell, to be no 'chequebook journalism' and 'no nipples'. Gloom spread among the Mirror's staff. Everything they feared about Maxwell seemed to be true, especially in the one area where his arrival might have promised improvements.

  Maxwell brought two great strengths to Holborn. He understood printing and the print unions, which he could reorganise efficiently, and he claimed that he was a superb salesman. Once those talents were utilised, he said, the Mirror would be profitable. Since the Fleet Street chapels were more powerful than those he had confronted at BPC, their subjugation would take time. The salesman's promise of 'One million extra readers within one year' could, he believed, be realised without delay. After waiting so many years, Maxwell was more impatient than usual to confront his arch-rival and overtake the Sun. In his first press conference on 14 July Maxwell had said, referring to the daily prize games which newspapers were using to attract readers, ‘I am not very keen on Bingo,' because it was a considerable expense which the Mirror had been compelled to undertake to match Murdoch. He wanted it to end.

  Three days later, Maxwell telephoned John Banks, the chairman and chief executive of the advertising agency Young and Rubicam, who had handled the Mirror Group account for many years. According to Banks, the instructions were 'to invent the most sensational game for his group of newspapers'. The brief was to produce a campaign within three days to 'beat the Bingo sensation of the Sun' which would be 'the most exciting game of the decade'. This time Banks's agency could not automatically expect to launch the new campaign because Maxwell had asked other agencies also to offer presentations. So when Banks arrived at Headington Hall on the Sunday morning, he needed to present a concept which was even more audacious than his client could have imagined. Banks was unusually excited with his agency's idea. Called 'Who Dares Wins', a play on the motto of the crack SAS regiment, Banks presented a campaign which he calculated would endear itself to the architect of a 'Forward with Britain posture'. The game itself was nothing more than a variation of bingo but Banks added two major innovations. The prize would be £1 million cash and Maxwell would appear on television in person to introduce the new game with the immortal phrase, 'I'll make you a millionaire.'