Television and radio matter. It’s no coincidence that control of a broadcasting station is usually the first target at the outset of any self-respecting military coup. Television and radio shape the way we understand and interpret the world. A properly regulated media is designed to safeguard that “plurality of public voice” which is one of the cornerstones of a healthy democracy, ensuring that all of a nation’s citizens are promptly, accurately and impartially informed. Like all too few other institutions, once trusted and respected, the broadcaster is part of the social glue which helps to bind communities together.

And as we have recently been vividly reminded – retaining that trust is everything.

But with the advent of satellites, the internet and other forms of electronic delivery, the regulation of communications has become much, much more complex. It was this complexity which the Government sought to get to grips with when it set out its original proposals for a Communications Bill.

The Government’s starting position seemed to be that deregulating the media in this country would have, at worst, a neutral impact on our democracy - clearing the way for massive new investment by a generation of media moguls whose most devout wish was to safeguard the diversity of voices that are available to us across our airwaves. My reaction to this assertion was – dream on! I fundamentally disagreed with the Government – in fact I believed that the kind of deregulation they envisaged in which, for example, Rupert Murdoch was being all-but encouraged to take control of Channel 5, would, in the long run, prove lethal to our notion of a plural, informed democracy.

I tried to draw attention to the dangers of unregulated cross-media ownership. And for that reason alone opposed every provision in the Bill that would allow Channel Five, or any terrestrial channel, to be wholly or partially owned by any large national Newspaper Group.

I believe that a successful media environment tends not to happen by accident, and when it does occur it can, and to my mind absolutely should, be supported by thoughtful and firm regulation. What is certain is that plurality and diversity are not, and never can be, a natural by-product of unregulated market forces. And it was here that I parted company with the Government’s draft Bill.

This summer we have witnessed an intense and very specific debate about the role the media plays in our public life. The BBC has, of course, been at the eye of this particular storm. But the furore has seen the entire political and media culture of this country put under the microscope. And this debate, for me, perfectly underlines why purposeful and sensitive regulation is so vital to the future of our democracy.

As has been widely noted, the motives of many of the media organisations in this current debate are only too transparent. There are those who would like nothing better than to see the back of the present Government. There are those who would like nothing better than to see the back of the BBC. There are those who believe they have a unique opportunity to achieve both!

Newspapers have invariably taken up their editorial line according to who they despise the most; the BBC, or the present Government. This editorial line has, in turn, infected much of their reporting. If you don’t believe me, just open the pages of the Daily Mail, the Telegraph, the Sun or The Times; the boundary between reporting, and tendentious argument, is now all but impossible to distinguish.

It’s certainly very distant from the noble vision of C.P. Scott, that most celebrated editor of the Guardian. In 1921 to mark the centenary of the Guardian and his 50th anniversary as editor, he wrote an essay entitled 'A Hundred Years'. Forgive me for quoting it at some length, but in his essay, Scott observed that:

“A newspaper has two sides to it. It is a business, like any other, and has to pay in the material sense in order to live. But it is much more than a business; it is an institution; it reflects and it influences the life of a whole community; it may affect even wider destinies. It is, in its way, an instrument of government. It plays on the minds and consciences of men. It may educate, stimulate, assist, or it may do the opposite. It has, therefore, a moral as well as a material existence, and its character and influence are in the main determined by the balance of these two forces. It may make profit or power its first object, or it may conceive itself as fulfilling a higher and more exacting function.” He famously went on to say:

“Comment is free, but facts are sacred. The voice of opponents no less than that of friends has a right to be heard. It is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair.”

Reading the pages of some of our national newspapers today, it’s all too apparent how far they have removed themselves from that challenging vision. These days, it’s as if Scott’s famous dictum has been reversed; many editors now act as if facts were free, but comment sacred. “Facts”, as they see it, exist to be manipulated at the convenience of comment and prejudice. In some newspapers, the hand of the proprietor can be all too visibly detected, not only in the editorials, but unambiguously splashed across the news pages.

In one sense or another we are all the victims of spin. We are all caught in an endless cycle of blame and counter-blame. As a consequence we all from time to time lose our sense of perspective.

Does anyone really believe that it was a simple coincidence that all but one of the 175 newspapers controlled by Rupert Murdoch across the globe, supported the war against Iraq? Does anyone seriously believe that such unanimity arises by accident, and bears absolutely no relation to the forcefully articulated views of a forceful proprietor about the urgent need for force in Iraq?

But to be fair, it’s not just Mr Murdoch and his fellow media moguls who are responsible for all of the developments now afflicting our media. The BBC too has allowed itself to become caught up in an insidious culture in which almost all debate is framed as adversarial.

How many of us listening to the Today programme on Radio 4 each morning have not, from time to time, become exasperated by a not always justified tone of hostile scepticism, or by the seemingly endless interruptions? Facts should hold centre stage, not the journalist, nor even the interviewee driven by an all too naked desire to promote their personal reputation. Could it be that this same developing sub-culture encourages reporters to over-embellish stories which, in some cases, wouldn’t quite stand up on their own merits?

This growing attitude of expediency toward “facts” now adopted by many of those working in our media, reminds me of W.E. Forster’s famous quote about Gladstone, as being a man who, "could persuade most people of most things, but above all, could persuade himself of almost anything". As I said earlier, this truly is an Alice-in-Wonderland world in which “facts are free, but comments, attitudes and, worst of all, prejudices remain all but sacred.”

Let me be clear. I am not arguing for some compliant, slavish media of the kind favoured by totalitarian regimes. Arguing implications is fine. Distorting underlying facts isn’t. Establishing the clearest possible differentiation between opinion and fact ought to be one of the fundamental duties of any responsible media organisation.

Most editors would be appalled if they suspected that their journalists were influenced in what they wrote by those advertisers who are, after all, partly paying their wages. Any editor who turned a blind eye to such dodgy commercial practices would quickly lose the trust of their readers.

Yet many of those same editors seem perfectly happy for their journalists’ reporting of events to be shaped by the ideological preferences of their proprietors. For the most part they don’t even spot the paradox! And some of us, as readers, seem almost indifferent to that daily deceit.

I find all of these to be desperately worrying developments; most especially because there are growing pressures on television news to travel down the same path towards rather more explicit partisanship.

This concern was made real by the way the recent war in Iraq was covered by Fox News. Although only available on satellite in this country, it is widely watched in the United States. Its shamelessly partial coverage seemed to use patriotism as the opiate which lulled the audience into a form of unquestioning compliance.

The corporate motto of Fox may be “Fair and Balanced” but its war coverage demonstrated the extent to which Mr. Murdoch and his foot soldiers had abandoned any ambition for impartiality.

This is especially worrying when you consider the power and reach of the medium. Television is the main source of world news for nearly 80% of the UK population, as compared with national newspapers which similarly serve only 9%. In the words of the Independent Television Commission, “It is the only news medium presently capable of reaching across the whole of British society”. But the way in which rolling news is changing the face of television journalism poses serious questions for the public interest. The refusal to thoughtfully interrogate and contextualise events as they happen, the lack of on-screen correction and apology, combined with the erosion of impartiality in favour of politicised agendas, all of this can only be very unhealthy.

As a former film producer, I’m only too aware of how easily visual images can be manipulated to serve particular ends. I’ve remained profoundly aware that the responsibility for creating moving images for television or the cinema is becoming, if anything, ever more potent - you really are tinkering around in people's minds, imprinting emotions, messages and ideas which may influence them for the rest of their lives.

This is an influence which, in my experience, filmmakers simultaneously yearn for, but are for the most part, terrified of acknowledging.

We inhabit a world on which the media reports 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We are all subjected to a barrage of news, opinion, “facts”, and comment. In such an environment it is probably too much to hope that every journalistic excess can be reined in.

All of which gives force to my belief that any such proliferation of media demands a regulatory framework which encourages, in fact enables, the most trusted forms of “public service” broadcasting to flourish. Sadly we cannot legislate for good journalism, but we can legislate for the conditions under which the very best journalism is nurtured and sustained. We can create frameworks in which each new technology becomes a spur for diversity, and not an instrument of its erosion.

I have fought all of my life for a media environment, in Film, in Television and in the Press, of which we can be truly proud. That’s why so many of us battled long and hard to secure changes to the Communications Act, changes which, although imperfect, I believe will prove to be of benefit all the citizens of this country.

Let’s be clear, we are not just consumers, we are citizens. And in the world of information that difference is very important: yes, most of us are consumers some of the time; but all of us are citizens all of the time - or should be!