Prime minister Tony Blair attempted to bypass the mainstream media
by conducting a Q&A with journalists Michael White and Sarah Sands
which was published directly on the Number 10 website.
They
cherry-picked questions from over 500 set in by members of the public apparently as part of bid to side-step perceived bias or
sensationalism in the way the Prime Minister is portrayed in the press
– the full 7,000 word transcript is available to view at number10.gov.uk.
The
top line from the interview, put out by the Press Association, was that
Blair was backing the police “101 per cent” over the terrorism raid on
a north London house this week which led to a man being shot.
Sands,
former editor of the Sunday Telegraph, wrote in today’s Daily Mail that
Blair “has a deam of side-stepping the snide, sour, salacious press and
reaching out through the democratic, kindly world of the internet.
nstead of the distorted, bitter questions asked by lobby journalists,
real people can express their concerns.”
But she added: “The questions from real people were uncannily close to the questions asked by journalists.”
The interview is also available from Number 10 as a sound file and as web viewable video.
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