Paul Dacre

Paul Dacre
Born	Paul Michael Dacre 14 November 1948 Arnos Grove, London, England[1]
Nationality	British
Alma mater	University College School University of Leeds
Occupation	Journalist and newspaper editor
Employer	Daily Mail and General Trust
Known for	Editor of the Daily Mail
Spouse(s)	Kathleen Thomson
Children	2 sons[2]
Parent(s)	Peter Dacre (deceased), Joan

Paul Michael Dacre (/ˈdeɪkər/; born 14 November 1948^[1]) is an English journalist and editor of the British newspaper the Daily Mail. He is also editor-in-chief of dmg media, which publishes the Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday, the free daily tabloid Metro, and other titles.^[3] He is a director of the Daily Mail and General Trust plc (Associated Newspapers' holding group) and was a member of the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) from 1999^[4] to 2008. He left the PCC in order to become chairman of the PCC's Editors' Code of Practice Committee from April 2008.^[5] His departure from the post was announced at the beginning of December 2016.^[6]

In the British Press Awards, Dacre's Daily Mail has won the "Newspaper of the Year" category on six occasions, twice as often as any other title.^[7]

Early life

Dacre was born and grew up in the north London suburb of Arnos Grove in Enfield.^[8] His father, Peter, was a journalist on the Sunday Express whose work included show business features.^[9][10][11] His brother, Nigel, was editor of ITV's news programmes from 1995 to 2002.^[12]

He was educated at University College School, an independent school in Hampstead, on a state scholarship,^[13] where he was head of house.^[14] In his school holidays, he worked as a messenger at the Sunday Express, and during his pre-university gap year as a trainee in the Daily Express.^[11] From 1967 he read English at the University of Leeds,^[15] while Jack Straw was President of the Student's Union.^[14]

While at university, he became involved with the Leeds Student newspaper, rising to the position of editor. At this time he identified with the liberal end of the political spectrum on issues including gay rights and drug use,^[16] and wrote editorials in support of a student sit-in at Leeds organised by Straw.^[17] "'If you don’t have a left-wing period when you go to university, you should be shot'", he has said.^[11] From his early experiences as an editor of a student newspaper, Dacre said in November 2008 he learned that "dull [content] doesn’t sell newspapers. Boring doesn’t pay the mortgage", but also that "sensation sells papers".^[17]

On graduation in 1971, he joined the Daily Express in Manchester for a six-month trial;^[13] after this he was given a full-time job on the Express. Concerning his career choice, Dacre commented in an interview for the British Journalism Review in 2002 that he "never any desire to do anything other than journalism".^[11]

Early career

At the Express, Dacre worked as correspondent in a variety of locations before being sent to Washington, D.C., in 1976 to cover that year's American presidential election,^[11] remaining there until 1979, when he moved to New York as a correspondent.^[18] It was at this time that his politics shifted to the right:

“

I don’t see how anybody can go to America, work there for six years and not be enthralled by the energy of the free market. America taught me the power of the free market, as opposed to the State, to improve the lives of the vast majority of ordinary people.[11]

”

After his years at the Express bureau, Dacre was head-hunted by David English to be Bureau chief for the Mail in 1980,^[18] but was brought back to the UK in 1983 to be news editor.^[18] A profile in The Independent in 1992 recounted his behaviour in this period: "It was terrifying stuff. He would rampage through the newsroom with his arms flailing like a windmill, scratching himself manically as he fired himself up."^[14] Subsequently, he became assistant editor (news and features), assistant editor (features) in 1987, executive editor the following year and associate editor in 1989.^[19]

He was appointed editor of the Evening Standard in March 1991 and replaced Sir David English the following year as editor of the Daily Mail,^[20] after turning down an offer from Rupert Murdoch to edit The Times.^[11][20] Dacre believed that Murdoch "would not accept my desire to edit with freedom".^[21] It was his approach to the job of editor—"hard-working, disciplined, confrontational"^[13]—which had led Murdoch to attempt to hire him. For the Mail, Dacre was considered important enough for English to become editor-in-chief, considered a means of sidelining someone considered unsackable.^[13] After English's death in March 1998, Dacre himself became the Mail Group's editor-in-chief the following July,^[19] in addition to remaining as editor of the Daily Mail.^[3]

Editor of the Daily Mail

Stephen Lawrence case

Dacre's most prominent newspaper campaign was in 1997, against the suspects who were acquitted of the murder in 1993 of the black teenager Stephen Lawrence. According to Nick Davies in Flat Earth News the paper originally intended an attack on the groups arguing for an inquiry into the Lawrence murder, but the paper's reporter Hal Austin, on interviewing Neville and Doreen Lawrence, realised that some years earlier, Neville had worked at Dacre's home in Islington as a plasterer,^[21] and the news desk instructed Austin to "Do something sympathetic" about the case.^[22] Dacre eventually used the headline "MURDERERS" accusing the suspects of the crime on 14 February 1997.^[23] He repeated this headline in 2006.

On the final day of the inquest held at the coroner’s court, Dacre and other Mail executives had lunch with Sir Paul Condon, then Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, "who very eloquently told me they were as guilty as sin".^[11] Four of the five suspects had never provided any alibi for their whereabouts on the night of Stephen Lawrence's murder and they invoked the privilege against self incrimination to avoid giving evidence and exposing themselves to cross examination. The police believed that the alibi of the fifth suspect was unconvincing. The newspaper on 14 February 1997, under its headline asserted: "The Mail accuses these men of killing. If we are wrong, let them sue us".^[24] No claim was issued and the newspaper received significant acclaim and opprobrium as a result.^[11] Two of the men featured on the Mail front page^[23] were convicted of Stephen Lawrence's murder in January 2012.^[25] Jonathan Freedland of The Guardian wrote of the development: "He made an unlikely anti-racist campaigner, but there were few voices more critical in the demand for justice for Stephen Lawrence than Paul Dacre and the Daily Mail.^[26]

On other occasions, the Mail under Dacre has been criticised for its racist attitude towards the stories it chooses to cover. Nick Davies recounts an anecdote from a former senior news reporter who en route to a murder scene of a woman and her two children 300 miles away was told to return because the victims were black.^[27] Davies comments: "Perhaps I have been unlucky, but I have never come across a reporter from the Daily Mail who did not have some similar story, of black people being excluded from the paper because of their colour."^[27]

The New Labour years

Seen as "highly influential politically"^[28] by the conservative journalist Simon Heffer, Dacre said, in a talk given to students in January 2007, that the Conservative Party cannot be guaranteed the Mail's support at the 2010 general election, and he also queried whether the party was still conservative.^[28]

Indeed, the Mail under Dacre briefly had positive views of New Labour until the Ecclestone scandal and clashes with the government's Director of Communications Alastair Campbell cooled the relationship thanks to the practice of spin doctoring.^[29] Dacre said in 2004:

“

I think [the Blair] government, through the Campbell approach, [has] put [the] hostility [of the press towards politicians] on a different footing. I think after a while the media industry came to believe that it was disseminating untruths and misrepresenting the truth as a matter of course.[30]

”

As recounted by John Lloyd in 2004 though, Tim Allan, Campbell's assistant in Labour's first term, "the government [spent] years trying to be chummy with the Daily Mail... Blair sees himself as the great persuader, able to convince anyone. But they didn't want to like him. The government raised far too much time trying to turn the Mail around".^[31]

The newspaper also turned against Cherie Blair, the former Prime Minister's wife, when the Blairs' lawyers prevented the publication of a former nanny's memoirs;^[32] official regulations prevent press revelations regarding the children of public figures. The Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday also came into direct conflict with No. 10 in 2002 for their pursuit of Cherie Blair's connection to the conman Peter Foster, although Dacre denied any "agenda apart from good journalism".^[33] Tony Blair targeted the Mail titles directly, denouncing "parts of the media that will take what there is that is true and then turn it round into something that is a total distortion of the real truth".^[33] Dacre was reportedly horrified when he saw Cherie Blair breastfeeding in public.^[1]

Reportedly though, Dacre saw the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown as a "kindred spirit".^[34] An "incomprehensible and grovelling friendship" on the part of Brown according to journalist Polly Toynbee with "Labour's worst enemy".^[35] In 2002, when Brown was Chancellor of the Exchequer, Dacre commented: "I have an awful lot of admiration for Gordon Brown. I feel he is one of the very few politicians of this administration who's touched by the mantle of greatness".^[11] Brown returned the favour to Dacre at an event at the Savoy Hotel which celebrated the tenth anniversary of his editorship of the Mail in 2003. In a video presentation, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer said that Dacre "has devised, developed and delivered one of the great newspaper success stories of any generation" and was "someone of great journalistic skill, an editor of great distinction and someone of very great personal warmth".^[36][37] Campbell, however, has written that Brown in conversation always "adamantly denied" being a "personal friend" of Dacre.^[29] The Home Secretary David Blunkett was present at the event in person and also praised Dacre.^[37] Although he has Eurosceptic inclinations, Dacre backed Kenneth Clarke, an enthusiast for the European Union, to be leader of the Conservative Party on two occasions.^[7]

Dacre chaired an independent inquiry, commissioned by Gordon Brown, on the release of government information, which reported at the end of January 2009. It recommended the halving of the thirty-year rule in the remaining areas where it still applied. Dacre wrote: "the existing rule seemed to condone unnecessary secrecy rather than protecting necessary confidentiality. This perception of secrecy was breeding public cynicism".^[38] In addition, the report called for ("as a matter of urgency") a review of the government's methods of preserving information held digitally for their long-term survival. It also called for an independent review of the "Radcliffe" rules, which apply to the information released in the memoirs of former ministers, in the light of the changes it recommended.^[39]

Editorial strategy

According to the academic and journalist John Lloyd, responding in 2007, Dacre is currently the only "British newspaper editor who stamps himself on his newspaper every morning" reflecting "his unique blend of libertarian-authoritarian Conservatism".^[40] Some years later, at the Leveson Inquiry in February 2012, Dacre rejected the idea that he imposes his will on the paper. He commented that some issues contain opinions which "make my hair go white" and asserted that some journalists "would resign if I told them what to write".^[41] Peter Preston noted: "He can hire leading voices from the Guardian or the Observer and let them say exactly what they'd have said in their old homes."^[42]

For his admirers, Dacre has maintained his newspaper's defence of family values and the "small-c" conservative interests of the suburban middle-classes in the south of England. The editor himself has said: "The family is the greatest institution on God’s green earth."^[43] Dacre once suggested to a new employee, sports' columnist Des Kelly, that he should "Make them laugh, make them cry, or make them angry".^[44] From the business point of view, Dacre's time as editor has been highly successful: "no editor can point to rises in sales that come anywhere near Dacre's in the [first] 10 years that he has been in the job".^[8]

Dacre's stated objective is:

“

...to restore much more integrity to the British political system than exists at the moment, and [one hopes] then that [the] newspapers will respond in kind and gradually will persuade people that what they hear in Parliament is to be believed, and they will trust the newspapers to tell them that.[45]

”

He has pursued a strategy of appointing star columnists established at other newspapers at significantly raised salaries, including in 2006, Peter Oborne (for £200,000 per annum) and Tom Utley (for £120,000). Richard Littlejohn was then on £700,00 a year.^[46] This practice led to a legal entanglement in 2005 with The Sun when the terms of Littlejohn's contract came into conflict with his obligations to his former newspaper. Dacre's appearance in the High Court was only averted by a few days.^[47] Even critics, such as Peter Wilby,^[48] consider the Mail "a technically brilliant paper".^[49]

At the end of 2007, there was speculation in the press over Paul Dacre's future at the Daily Mail. Dacre is known to have a heart condition. He was off work for three months in mid-2007,^[50] and for three weeks that autumn with what was described as "gastric flu". Stephen Glover, a Mail columnist, wrote urging the parent company DMGT to make a statement ending the uncertainty;^[51] four days later the company reaffirmed Dacre's position.^[52]

Responses

According to Cristina Odone in The Observer, Dacre has a reputation towards underlings of "verbal abuse [and] a drill sergeant's delight in public humiliation"^[53] which also includes verbal abuse.^[16] According to Nick Davies in his book Flat Earth News^[54] his staff call his morning editorial meetings the "Vagina Monologues" because of his habit of calling everybody a "cunt". In his Desert Island Discs appearance in 2004, host Sue Lawley quizzed him on his methods, to which Dacre responded: "Shouting creates energy, energy creates great headlines."^[43] Conrad Black, a convicted fraudster and ex-proprietor of the Telegraph papers, considers him "a saturnine and capricious manipulator".^[55] Peter Wilby, in a December 2013 profile for the New Statesman, quoted an anonymous source, who said of Dacre: "He’s no longer the expletive volcano he once was; his barbs these days tend to concern the brainpower of his target and their supposed laziness."^[7]

Polly Toynbee in 2004 called the newspaper a "daily blast of fear and loathing" and Dacre himself is "the most arrogant bully of us all".^[56] Dacre reportedly has difficulties relating to women,^[1][7] and for Toynbee the Mail's attitude under his editorship reflects this. In 2007, Toynbee claimed the paper shares the opinions of Iran's President Ahmadinejad when it responded to his country's release of the hostage Faye Turney in April 2007.^[57] After attempting to buy her story, according to the Ministry of Defence, "with a very substantial sum", and Turney going elsewhere, the paper denounced her as an "unfit mother".^[35] Simon O'Hagan, writing in The Independent, stated: "As far as Dacre is concerned, women have no right to go out and earn money of their own, let alone rise to positions of power, when they also have a family".^[8] Rachel Johnson, writing in The Independent in 2001, noted that photographs taken of women for the features pages of the Mail must comply with the 'Dacre Rules'. She quotes a Mail photographer: "No jeans. No black [clothes]. No trousers. Paul Dacre only wants women to appear wearing dresses. If skirts, only to the knee."^[58]

In 2005, the then Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, long in conflict with the London Evening Standard, then wholly owned by the same media group as the Mail, branded the Mail titles "the most reprehensibly edited" publications in the world.^[59] The Mail's treatment of asylum seekers and members of other vulnerable groups is a particular source of grievance for many critics, not only Livingstone. "Maybe we anti-racists have been naive to think that [the Stephen Lawrence campaign] was anything more than an aberration," suggests Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, adding: "wouldn't it be better if this extraordinary editor decided to use his influence to create just a little more understanding of why refugees leave their countries, and what most of them bring to our nation?"^[60] Stephen Fry in August 2013 called Dacre a "frothing autocrat" and hypocrite who "sends his son to Eton" but mocked Fry "for being posh". Fry added: "He decries indecency on one page and pushes his male readers into a semi over a semi-nude actress on another. His cancer scare, miracle cure stories are sickeningly anti-science and the only good thing to be said about his Mail is that no one decent or educated believes in it".^[61][62]

A MORI poll in 2005 asked 30 editors from the national and regional press and from the broadcasting industry for the name of the editor they most admired. Dacre won the poll.^[63] For Kelvin MacKenzie, the former editor of The Sun writing in 2005, he is "comfortably Britain’s finest editor" who arrives at work "determined to crush the life out of his rivals".^[64] Publicist Max Clifford commented in February 2003 that "Paul Dacre is virtually a law [un]to himself" in not being influenced by the Daily Mail's publisher.^[65] Speaking about the Mail and its readers in 2003, Peter Oborne said that its "detachment from metropolitan opinion is the Daily Mail's overwhelming strength."^[37]

Public appearances

Dacre has a reputation for avoiding publicity and rarely giving interviews. He would prefer to "potter in his garden" than maintain a high profile in London's media circles,^[1] and he takes a dim view of "celebrity editors" such as the former editor of the Daily Mirror, Piers Morgan.^[66] Responding to comments on his more limited public visibility, he claims:

“

...the more editors think they are public figures and the more they become speaking heads on TV chat shows the more their newspapers decline and they do not last very long in their jobs. That is my experience. My job is to edit my newspaper, to have a relationship with my readers, to reflect my readers' views and to defend their interest. It is not to offer myself up to you or television or radio interviewers.[67]

”

He gave the Cudlipp Lecture^[68] at the London College of Communication on 22 January 2007.^[69] For him, Britain is dominated by a "subsidariat", those newspapers whose "journalism and values—invariably liberal, metropolitan and politically correct, and I include the pinkish Times here—don't connect with sufficient readers to be commercially viable" and make a profit.^[70] Dacre also attacked the BBC as a "monolith" pursuing "Cultural Marxism" which has a singular world view and is contemptuous of "ordinary people".^[71] According to Dacre:

“

The right to disagree was axiomatic to classical liberalism, but the BBC's political correctness is, in fact, an ideology of rigid self-righteousness in which those who do not conform are ignored, silenced, or vilified as sexist, racist, fascist or judgmental. Thus, with this assault on reason, are whole areas of legitimate debate—in education, health, race relations and law and order—shut down, and the corporation, which glories in being open-minded, has become a closed-thought system operating a kind of Orwellian Newspeak."[69]

”

He was also critical of David Cameron, then just over a year into his leadership of the Conservative Party: "Today's Tories are obsessed by the BBC. They saw what its attack dogs did to [William] Hague, [Iain] Duncan Smith and [Michael] Howard. Cameron's cuddly blend of eco-politics and work/life balance, his embrace of Polly Toynbee, a columnist who loathes everything Conservatism stands for, but is a totemic figure to the BBC, his sidelining of Thatcherism and his banishing of all talk of lower taxes, lower immigration and euroscepticism are all part of the Tories' blood sacrifice to the BBC god."^[72]

In The Guardian Peter Wilby claimed that Dacre's speech made "many listeners feel they were stuck in the back of a taxi with a particularly boring and opinionated driver".^[48] Martin Kettle,^[73] a columnist in The Guardian, questioned whether Dacre's assertion that the Mail represents Conservative voters can be sustained.^[74] Kettle points out that in the 2005 general election 22% of Mail readers voted Labour, 14% for the Liberal Democrats and 7% for other non-Conservative candidates. "In this respect, therefore, the editor who claims to have a hotline to the national mood turns out to have something of a crossed line instead", Kettle wrote.^[73]

Dacre became chairman of the PCC's Editors' Code of Practice Committee in April 2008.^[5] On 9 November 2008, Dacre gave a speech to the Society of Editors in which he was critical of the emerging pressures for privacy laws following the conclusion of the Max Mosley libel case against the News of the World and Mr Justice Eady's closing remarks.^[17][75] Dacre and the PCC were criticised directly by Mosley in March 2009 at a meeting of the culture, media and sport committee at the House of Commons.^[76] but Dacre defended the newspaper industry's current system of self-regulation under the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) in his statement accompanying the annual report published in 2010.^[77] In April 2009 Dacre made a further appearance in front of the House of Commons CMSSC, where he criticised current libel laws and the fees charged by law firms.^[78] Justice Eady referred to Dacre's submission (from "the man from the Daily Mail") in December 2009 at a conference about privacy organised by Justice. "this ad hominem approach does absolutely nothing to further the debate".^[79]

The Leveson Inquiry

Dacre himself appeared on three occasions at the Leveson Inquiry, which had been set up by the Conservative Prime Minister, David Cameron. He gave a speech at a Leveson seminar concerning press standards on 12 October 2011.^[80]

He re-asserted his opinion that self-regulation "in a considerably beefed up form" remained "the only viable way of policing a genuinely free press".^[80] He was critical of Cameron ("too close to News International") who "in a pretty cynical act of political expediency has prejudiced the outcome of this inquiry by declaring that the" Press Complaints Commission, "an institution he'd been committed to only a few weeks previously, was a 'failed' body".^[81] Dacre claimed legislation passed in the last 20 years already helped stop necessary journalistic enquiry, and meant that the press was "already on the very cusp of being over regulated". After returning to his negative opinion of liberals, who "by and large hate all the popular press", he claimed "that Britain's commercially viable free press – because it is in hock to nobody – is the only really free media in this country."^[80] His advocacy of newspaper owners being legally unable to reject any regulatory body was viewed as a reference to Richard Desmond, whose Northern & Shell company owns the Daily Express, and had withdrawn from the PCC.^[82]

In his first cross-examination on 6 February, Dacre admitted that the Mail had used the private detective Steve Whittamore, who was jailed in 2005 for illegally accessing information, but claimed that the rest of the British press had done so too.^[83] Peter Wright, now a former editor of The Mail on Sunday, had said in his session that the Sunday paper continued using Whittamore for 18 months after his conviction, which Dacre effectively confirmed.^[84] A suggestion from Dacre for a new "press card", to be supervised by a new body,^[41][85] received support from The Independent^[86] but was rejected by commentators and other interested parties.^[87]

The actor Hugh Grant had accused the Mail of using phone hacking to report on his private life,^[88] although Dacre himself had made "extensive enquiries" to establish his newspapers had not used phone hacking.^[89][90] Dacre had accused Grant of indulging in a "mendacious smear" in a November 2011 statement.^[83][91] He refused to retract his response to Hugh Grant at both appearances at the hearings, unless Grant withdrew his statement. He was quickly recalled on this specific issue,^[92] and again on 9 February 2012, he rejected calls that he should retract his allegation that actor Hugh Grant lied.^[93] DMGT had paid damages to Grant for a false February 2007 story in The Mail on Sunday, but Dacre accused Grant of being "obsessed with trying to drag the Daily Mail into another newspaper's scandal".^[94]

Grant stood by his accusation in an interview on the Today radio programme on 11 February.^[89][95] Described as "unflinching, bordering on truculent" at his Leveson inquiry appearances in a New Yorker profile of the Mail,^[43] Dacre was criticised in the final report for his paper's coverage of several stories, including the articles about Grant.^[96][97] The "draconian inquiry", Dacre said of Leveson in a 2014 speech, was "a kind of show trial in which the industry was judged guilty and had to prove its innocence". His industry faced the "unremitting pressure of fighting what I have no doubt was a concerted attempt by the Liberal Establishment, in cahoots with Whitehall and the Judiciary, to break the only institution in Britain that is genuinely free of Government control – the commercially viable free press".^[98]

Ralph Miliband affair

In late September and October 2013, Dacre became the subject of criticism across the UK media and political spectrum after the Daily Mail published a piece on 28 September maligning Ralph Miliband, a deceased Marxist academic and father of Ed Miliband, the leader of the Labour opposition at the time. The original article, entitled "The Man Who Hated Britain",^[99] alleged that Ralph Miliband detested the country he and his father had fled to from Nazi-occupied Europe on the basis of a diary note written when he was sixteen and because of his left-wing views. Ed Miliband requested a right-of-reply piece to be published, which was granted but placed alongside a reprinting of the original article and an editorial criticising him for responding, while insisting that Ralph Miliband did hate Britain and that his son’s ambition was to inflict his father’s Marxism upon the country.^[100]

The criticism of Ralph Miliband, and his son's response, came in the run-up to a possible agreement between the media and parliament over the findings of the Leveson inquiry, a point which was made in the Mail's editorial on the subject.^[101] The articles published by the Mail were criticised by publications including The Spectator^[102] and The Times,^[103] as well as by major figures in the Conservative Party. Both Prime Minister David Cameron and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg empathised with Ed Miliband's response.^[104][105] Former Conservative Deputy Prime Minister Michael Heseltine condemned the Mail for demeaning the level of political debate, as did former Conservative cabinet minister John Moore, who had been taught by Ralph Miliband at LSE.^[106]

The article also brought Dacre's position as editor-in-chief of Associated Newspapers under scrutiny, with Roy Greenslade accusing him of making poor decision making.^[107] Paul Dacre was given a right of reply by The Guardian a fortnight later: "As the week progressed and the hysteria increased, it became clear that this was no longer a story about an article on Mr Miliband's Marxist father but a full-scale war by the BBC and the left against the paper that is their most vocal critic."^[90]

Post-Brexit

The Daily Mail backed the 'leave' option, or Brexit vote, in the 2016 membership referendum in the edition of 21 June following several weeks emphasis on stories critical of immigration.^[108][109] According to David Bond in the Financial Times in July 2016, the paper and its editor "have been leading the Eurosceptic charge against Brussels for two decades".^[110] In contrast, the editor of sister title The Mail on Sunday, Geordie Greig, backed the 'remain' option in the referendum, although Dacre is formally his superior.^[109][111] The Mail backed Theresa May as the candidate to succeed David Cameron as Prime Minister following his resignation after the referendum vote was announced.^[110][112] According to Andy Beckett in The Guardian, "Dacre and his paper remained lukewarm towards the metropolitan Cameron", although unlike the Labour opposition under Ed Miliband after the phone hacking scandal involving its tabloid rivals in the Murdoch group, Cameron's governments had remained "tabloid-friendly".^[113]

Following Theresa May's announcement at the 2016 Conservative Party conference that she would trigger Article 50 by March 2017, Anthony Barnett wrote in an article for openDemocracy about "the contemporary political philosophy" of which May "is the living incarnation of an ideology worked out over three decades in the pages of that paper" which he termed "Dacreism". According to Barnett, Dacre "wants to combine the conviction and clarity of Thatcherism with the inclusiveness of Churchillism. As a formula for appealing to middle-class readers nostalgic for the lost world of post-war greatness, yet fearful of anything that smacks of the collectivism of those years" his approach "became an astonishing formula for readers and advertisers".^[114]

In the period of political uncertainty following the Brexit vote, The Guardian's Roy Greenslade suggested that the Daily Mail's "savage" "full-frontal assault on ...anyone hopeful of upending the EU referendum vote for Brexit" though a reflection of the Mail's readership was also a reflection of Dacre's worries that MPs might reverse or mitigate the vote.^[115]

Dacre's departure from the post of Chairman of the Editors' Code of Practice Committee, which he had held since 2008,^[5] was announced at the beginning of December 2016.^[6]

Private life

While he was a student at Leeds University, Dacre met his future wife, Kathleen,^[2][13] now a professor of drama studies.^[7] One of their two sons,^[2] James, is a theatre director.^[116][117]

For many years, Dacre has been the highest-paid newspaper editor in Britain. In 2008, Dacre received £1.62 million in salary and cash payments, an increase from the £1.49 million of the previous year.^[118] In 2015, according to DMGT's annual report, Dacre's income fell by nearly 40% to £1.4 after adopting the company's incentive plan, having risen by almost 25% to £2.4 million in total in 2014 over the amount he was paid in 2013.^[119][120]

For his estates in Sussex and near Ullapool in the Scottish highlands, Dacre has benefited from subsidies under the Common Agricultural Policy from the European Union. In 2014, he received £88,000 for the two holdings and under the exchange rate of late March 2016, he is believed to have received £460,000 since 2011.^[121] Polly Toynbee wrote in The Guardian: "Who would have thought the self-appointed voice of 'middle England' harboured such aristocratic fantasies as to acquire a mighty Scottish estate, complete with deer stalking, grouse shooting and salmon fishing?"^[122]

References

1. James Robinson "Shy, but the Mail's powerful editor is far from retiring", The Observer, 9 October 2008
2. Paul Dacre's entry in Who's Who gives his wife's birth name as Kathleen Thomson and indicates that the couple have two sons.
3. "Paul Dacre appointed Editor-in-Chief", Daily Mail and General Trust, 16 July 1998. Retrieved 5 December 2012.
4. Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport Minutes of Evidence, House of Commons, 25 March 2003, Appendix XIX. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
5. "Paul Dacre to chair Editors' Code of Practice committee". Press Gazette. 4 March 2008. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
6. Martinson, Jane (1 December 2016). "Paul Dacre to step down as chair of journalists' code of practice committee". The Guardian. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
7. Peter Wilby "Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail: The man who hates liberal Britain ", New Statesman, 19 December 2013 (online version: 2 January 2014)
8. Simon O'Hagan "The IoS Profile: Hate Mail - Paul Dacre", The Independent on Sunday, 15 December 2002
9. Who's Who articles for Paul and his brother Nigel give their mother's name as Joan and Paul's states that Paul Dacre and his wife have two sons.
10. "Peter Dacre: Obituary", The Times, 19 March 2003. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
11. Bill Hagerty "Paul Dacre: the zeal thing", British Journalism Review, Vol. 13, No. 3, 2002, pp. 11-22. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
12. "Dacre's reign at ITV news [ends]", BBC News, 5 September 2002. Retrieved 11 July 2007.
13. Biographical detail taken from Roy Greenslade Press Gang, London: Pan, 2004 [2003], pp. 593-5.
14. "Profile: That's enough fawning on the Tories - Ed: Paul Dacre, a fresh stamp on the 'Daily Mail'", The Independent, 3 October 1992
15. "Desert Island Discs" promotion, 25 January 2004. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
16. Andy Beckett "Paul Dacre: the most dangerous man in Britain?", The Guardian, 22 February 2001. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
17. Paul Dacre "Society of Editors: Paul Dacre's speech in full", Press Gazette, 9 November 2008 Archived by the Wayback machine
18. Dennis Griffiths (ed.) The Encyclopedia of the British Press, 1422–1992, London and Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1992, p.182. These details are replicated in Griffiths' later Fleet Street: Five Hundred Years of the Press, London: The British Library, 2006, p.379
19. Dennis Griffiths Fleet Street: Five Hundred Years of the Press, p.379
20. Steve Boggan "Media: Wind of change in Kensington: Will the Daily Mail still be rallying the Tory faithful?", The Independent, 15 July 1992
21. Leeds Student interview cited in "Dacre speaks out on Murdoch and Desmond", Press Gazette, 27 October 2006. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
22. Nick Davies Flat Earth News, 2008, London: Chatto and Windus, p.373
23. Stephen Wright "The Mail's victory: How Stephen Lawrence's killers were finally brought to justice years after our front page sensationally branded the evil pair murderers" Daily Mail, 3 January 2011
24. quoted in Brian Carhcart The Case of Stephen Lawrence, 1999[2000], Penguin, p. 285.
25. Vikram Dodd and Sandra Laville "Stephen Lawrence verdict: Dobson and Norris guilty of racist murder", The Guardian, 3 January 2012
26. Freedland, Jonathan (3 January 2012). "In defence of Britain's tabloid newpapers". The Guardian. Retrieved 22 June 2016.
27. Davies p.371
28. Personal View (24 January 2007). "Cameron mocks the 'loonies and fruitcakes' of UKIP at his peril". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 4 October 2013.
29. Campbell, Alastair (5 November 2016), "Alastair Campbell vs The Mail", GQ, retrieved 7 November 2016
30. Select Committee on Public Administration Minutes of Evidence, Paul Dacre's response to Q133, 25 March 2004. Retrieved on 9 July 2007.
31. John Lloyd What the Media are doing to Our Politics, London: Constable, 2004, p.94
32. Anthony Sampson Who Runs This Place: The Anatomy of Britain in the 21st Century, 2004[2005], John Murray, p. 237
33. Born, Matt (12 December 2002). "Mail men deny any 'personal' agenda". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 4 October 2013.
34. Michael White "Best of enemies - PM's unlikely alliance with right wing editor", The Guardian, 30 June 2007
35. Polly Toynbee "Judge Dacre dispenses little justice from his bully pulpit", The Guardian, 11 November 2008
36. "Dacre receives the highest praises", Press Gazette, 14 March 2003. Retrieved 13 April 2008.
37. Francis Wheen and Peter Oborne "Is the Daily Mail bad for your health?" The Daily Telegraph, 25 April 2003
38. Christopher Hope "Official Government records should be released after 15 years not 30, report says", Daily Telegraph, 29 January 2009
39. Deborah Summers "30-year rule on government disclosure should be halved, Dacre inquiry says", The Guardian, 29 January 2009
40. "John Lloyd responds to Dacre's attack", Press Gazette, 9 February 2007. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
41. Gordon Rayner "Create press watchdog with power to strike off journalists, says editor", Daily Telegraph (website), 6 February 2012.
42. Peter Preston "Paul Dacre: a headline act making the news", The Observer, 16 October 2011
43. Lauren Collins "Mail Supremacy: The newspaper that rules Britain", The New Yorker, 2 April 2012
44. Des Kelly "My Life in [the] Media: Des Kelly", The Independent, 12 December 2005
45. Select Committee on Public Administration Minutes of Evidence, Paul Dacre's response to Q186, 25 March 2004. Retrieved on 25 May 2007.
46. Thynne, Jane (29 April 2006). "Is Paul Dacre the new Roman Abramovich?". The Independent on Sunday. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
47. "Sun meets Mail half way in battle for Littlejohn", Press Gazette, 25 October 2005. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
48. Peter Wilby "Dacre - all scowl and no substance", The Guardian, 29 January 2007
49. Peter Wilby "Dacre's bellyache", The Guardian, 10 November 2007
50. "The Spectator", The Independent, 2 September 2007. Retrieved 13 April 2008.
51. Stephen Glover "Why the 'Mail' needs to come forward and end these rumours", The Independent, 19 November 2007. Retrieved 13 April 2008.
52. Stephen Brook "Dacre has 'no intention of stepping down', says DMGT", The Guardian, 21 November 2008. Retrieved 13 April 2008.
53. Cristina Odone "The Daily Mail, the king and his courtiers", The Observer, 17 October 2005. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
54. Nick Davies Flat Earth News, page 379, 2008, Chatto & Windus.
55. Conrad Black "Everyone's nice guy - A review of A Journey: My Political Life by Tony Blair", The New Criterion, December 2010
56. Polly Toynbee "Dacre in the dock", The Guardian, 26 March 2004. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
57. Polly Toynbee "The liberation of the sexes from their pink and blue fates has hardly begun", The Guardian, 6 April 2007. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
58. Rachel Johnson "Women must be girls in a Mail world", The Independent, 3 July 2001 reprinted from The Spectator
59. Chris Tryhorn "Livingstone: Daily Mail is reprehensible", The Guardian, 15 February 2005. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
60. Yasmin Alibhai-Brown "Media: The colour of prejudice", The Independent, 9 February 1999
61. Moon, Timur (10 August 2013). "Stephen Fry Brands Daily Mail Editor Paul Dacre 'a Frothing Autocrat' as Olympics Spat Escalates". International Business Times. Retrieved 22 June 2016.
62. McCormick, Joseph Patrick (13 August 2013). "Stephen Fry compares Daily Mail Editor Paul Dacre to Mussolini in Sochi argument". Pink News. Retrieved 22 June 2016.
63. Ian Burrell "Dacre's attack: The accused answer back", The Independent, 29 January 2007. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
64. Kelvin MacKenzie "Why Dacre’s worth his million", British Journalism Review, Vol. 16, No. 1, 2005, pp. 70-74. Retrieved 27 May 2007.
65. Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport Minutes of Evidence, House of Commons, 25 February 2003, Max Clifford's response to Q90. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
66. Select Committee on Public Administration Minutes of Evidence Paul Dacre's response to Q146, 25 March 2004.
67. Select Committee on Public Administration Minutes of Evidence Paul Dacre's response to Q147, 25 March 2004. Retrieved on 25 May 2007.
68. Paul Dacre "Cudlipp lecture: 22 January 2007", Complete text (.pdf file). Retrieved 9 July 2007.
69. Paul Dacre "The BBC's cultural Marxism will trigger an American-style backlash", as reproduced on 'Comment is Free', The Guardian (website), 24 February 2007. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
70. Peter Cole "Why is Paul Dacre so bloody angry?", The Independent on Sunday, 28 January 2007, as reproduced on the Find Articles website. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
71. Owen Gibson "Daily Mail editor accuses BBC of indulging in cultural Marxism", The Guardian, 23 January 2007. Retrieved 25 May 2007.
72. "Mail editor slams 'Orwellian' BBC". BBC News. 23 January 2007. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
73. "Martin Kettle on Dacre's Cudlipp lecture", Press Gazette, 9 February 2007. Retrieved on 9 July 2007.
74. Dacre has made his claim in contexts other than his Cudlipp lecture. See the Select Committee on Public Administration Minutes of Evidence, Paul Dacre's response to Q91, 25 March 2004. Retrieved 9 July 2007.
75. Paul Dacre "The threat to our press", The Guardian, 10 November 2008.
76. Oliver Luft "Max Mosley attacks Paul Dacre and PCC to MPs", The Guardian, 10 March 2009
77. Roy Greenslade "Paul Dacre lashes 'ignorant and prejudiced' PCC critics", The Guardian (blog), 30 July 2010
78. Stephen Brook "Daily Mail's Paul Dacre attacks 'greedy libel law firms'", The Guardian, 23 April 2009
79. Joshua Rozenberg "Dacre ‘unconstructive’, says Eady", Standpoint" (blog), 1 December 2009
80. Paul Dacre "Paul Dacre's speech at the Leveson inquiry - full text", The Guardian, 12 October 2011; "Phone hacking: Daily Mail chief Paul Dacre's speech in full to Leveson inquiry", The Daily Telegraph
81. "Paul Dacre lambasts Prime Minister David Cameron as 'cynical and hypocritical' over PCC comments". The Daily Telegraph. 12 October 2011. Retrieved 13 October 2013.
82. Brian Cathcart ""Paul Dacre, the reluctant regulator, The Guardian, 13 October 2012. Desmond has criticised Dacre, see for example Dan Sabbagh "Interview: Express and Channel 5 boss Richard Desmond on Paul Dacre", The Guardian (website), 30 October 2011
83. "Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre 'knew of use of detectives'", BBC News, 6 February 2012
84. Press Association "Daily Mail Editor Paul Dacre Appears At Leveson Inquiry", The Huffington Post, 6 February 2012
85. For the Mail's own account see Vanessa Allen and Michael Seamark "A badge of good journalism: We need 'kite mark' for press standards, Mail Editor tells Leveson", Daily Mail (website), 7 February 2012
86. "Leading article: A proposal with some merit", The Independent, 7 February 2012
87. See, for example Roy Greenslade "Sorry, but a press card system won't come up trumps", London Evening Standard, 8 February 2012; Andrew Pugh "Stanistreet slams Dacre's 'ridiculous' press card plan", Press Gazette, 9 February 2012; James Ball "Paul Dacre's press accreditation plan should be struck off", The Guardian, 8 February 2012; 'Dominic Ponsford "Dacre's press cards plan facing Desmond veto", Press Gazette, 16 July 2012
88. Among other reasons for Grant's suspicions was his secretly taped conversation with Paul McMullan, a former tabloid journalist and photographer, had said the Mail used phone hacking until about 2006 or 2007. See Hugh Grant "The bugger, bugged", New Statesman, 12 April 2011
89. Wood, Heloise (13 February 2012). "Hugh Grant stands by 'inference' MoS hacked his phone". Press Gazette.
90. Dacre, Paul (12 October 2013). "Why is the left obsessed by the Daily Mail?". The Guardian. Retrieved 22 June 2016. Let it be said loud and clear that the Mail, unlike News International, did NOT hack people's phones or pay the police for stories. I have sworn that on oath.
91. Dacre had been directly involved in drafting the publisher's November 2011 statement according to Liz Hartley, manager of Associated Newspaper's editorial legal services, see Lisa O'Carroll "Paul Dacre had hand in accusing Hugh Grant of smears, Leveson inquiry hears", 'guardian.co.uk, 11 January 2012
92. Lisa O'Carroll "Leveson recalls Paul Dacre over Hugh Grant 'mendacious smears' claim", The Guardian, 7 February 2012
93. David Leigh and Josh Halliday "Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre refuses to retract Hugh Grant accusation", The Guardian, 9 February 2012.
94. "Leveson Inquiry: Paul Dacre stands firm over Grant", Daily Telegraph (website), 9 February 2012
95. Damien Pearse "Hugh Grant: Daily Mail 'trashes reputation' of those who question it", guardian.co.uk, 11 February 2012
96. Lisa O'Carrol, et al "Leveson report: the winners and losers", The Guardian, 29 November 2012
97. Holly Watts, et al "Leveson Report: the verdict on individual newspapers", Daily Telegraph (website), 29 November 2012
98. Dacre, Paul (29 October 2014). "Watch out, BBC. The political class may come for you next". The Spectator. Retrieved 22 June 2016.
99. Geoffrey Levy "The Man Who Hated Britain", Daily Mail (mailonline: 27 September), 28 September 2013
100. "Labour demands Ralph Miliband apology from Mail". BBC News. 2 October 2013. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
101. Oliver Wright "'A man who hated Britain': Ed Miliband accuses Daily Mail of 'appalling lie' about his father Ralph", The Independent, 1 October 2013
102. "Why didn't the Daily Mail stick to the 'red angle' when it came to Ralph Miliband?". Blogs.spectator.co.uk. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
103. Tim Montgomerie (28 September 2013). "Wanting to change Britain doesn't mean you hate it". The Times. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
104. Ridge, Sophy. "Cameron Supports Ed Miliband In Father Row". Sky News. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
105. Dominiczak, Peter (27 September 2013). "Nick Clegg claims The Daily Mail was "out of order" over Ed Miliband coverage". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
106. Nicholas Watt (2 October 2013). "Thatcher ally accuses Daily Mail of 'telling lies' about Ralph Miliband". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
107. Greenslade, Roy (3 October 2013). "Now Paul Dacre is the story as Miliband emerges with enhanced image". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
108. Martinson, Jane (21 June 2016). "Daily Mail backs Brexit in EU referendum". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
109. Mortimer, Caroline (21 June 2016). "EU referendum: Daily Mail breaks with Mail on Sunday to back Brexit". The Independent. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
110. Bond, David (19 July 2016). "Daily Mail comes down from Brexit high to face digital challenge". Financial Times. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
111. Ponsford, Dominic (20 June 2016). "Brexit poll: Mail on Sunday and The Times split from their sister titles and Back Remain". Press Gazette. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
112. Greenslade, Roy (1 July 2016). "Paul Dacre plays Tory kingmaker by supporting Theresa May". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
113. Beckett, Andy (27 October 2016). "Revenge of the tabloids". The Guardian. Retrieved 27 October 2016.
114. Barnett, Anthony (5 October 2016). "The Daily Mail takes power". openDemocracy UK. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
115. Greenslade, Roy (12 October 2016). "Daily Mail's attack on 'Bremoaners' reflects editor's Brexit fears". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
116. Dominic Cavendish "James Dacre interview: 'In ten minutes almost a thousand men were slaughtered'", The Daily Telegraph, 2013
117. Michael Coveney "A new Dacre take on morality", The Guardian, 15 August 2004. Retrieved 27 May 2007.
118. Richard Wray "Daily Mail editor Dacre paid £1.6m", The Guardian, 20 August 2009
119. Sweney, Mark (18 December 2015). "Daily Mail's Paul Dacre sees pay fall by almost 40%". The Guardian. Retrieved 18 December 2015.
120. Jason Deans "Paul Dacre earnings up by nearly 25% to £2.4m in 2014", 22 December 2014
121. Rawlinson, Kevin; Jackson, Jasper (30 March 2016). "Daily Mail editor received £88,000 in EU subsidies in 2014". The Guardian. Retrieved 31 March 2016.
122. Toynbee, Polly (31 March 2016). "Paul Dacre's EU subsidies hypocrisy won't halt the Daily Mail's Euro-lies". The Guardian. Retrieved 31 March 2016.