Alexander Lebedev, ex-spy, current banker, entrepreneur and newspaper proprietor, came to charm the Society of Editors in conference last week, and succeeded pretty triumphantly. He speaks English well enough to make jokes off the cuff. He's unpretentious, self-deprecating and he talks of the papers he owns or part owns as vital forces against corruption, tyranny and oppression.
He knows the names of the reporters on Novaya Gazeta who have died in the cause of freedom. He swears he doesn't want to second-guess his editors, not Geordie Greig on the Standard or Simon Kelner on the Indy. His wears his heart on his sleeve. What's not to like?
Only, perhaps, a fleeting feeling that Lebedev is too good to be true.When proprietors buy a paper – even for £1 – they usually have an idea what they want to do with it. But the freesheet strategy that has turned the Standard around was devised, months after purchase, by Greig, Andy Mullins, his CEO, and Justin Byam Shaw, their finance wizard. And the birth of the new Independent digest, i, was cooked up by the same triumvirate plus Kelner. Another wheeze that London sold to Moscow, who didn't seem to have any ideas of their own before putting their roubles down.
That's a very odd way of investing, when you think about it – a practice that grows odder still when you see how cost controls on the Standardhave pared down the chances for investigative reporting of the kind the big boss loves. And whatever else i – with its zippy graphics and short, sharp stories – is, it sure as Fabergé eggs isn't a medium for turning over stones or confronting tyrants.
In short, he talks great, crusading journalism worldwide but, in Britain at least, does he walk the walk?
