Among the most recent examples of misleading information about the EU to appear in the British press is an article published in April by the Sunday Times, and then picked up by other Anglo-Saxon media and blogs (see links), which attributes to Vice-President Tajani the statement that tourism is a "human right".
The article on the Sunday Times never quotes the commissioner as having made such a statement. Nevertheless, it pursues the argument under the headline "Brussels decrees holidays as a human right," underlining the alleged "hundreds of millions of pounds" that pursuing the idea would cost taxpayers.
What are human rights?
The UN declaration on human rights includes in its scope protection against slavery, torture, political, racial or sexual persecution. It stands to defend the right to life, to privacy, to marry and other fundamental principles.
The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights replicates the philosophy of the UN document and reaffirms basic principles, such as the freedom of expression and the right to liberty and security.
Tourism is a relatively recent activity that primarily takes place in developed countries, but since not everyone can afford it, it cannot be extended to the population at large and is obviously far from being a human right.
Indeed, this is the position of Commissioner Tajani himself. In a speech at a conference in Madrid in April, he spoke of tourism as "a right" (not 'human right') for people with reduced mobility or low income (EurActiv 14/04/10).
"Our unrivalled tourism resources must become fully accessible to those for whom travelling is difficult," he said, speaking to an audience of experts in the tourism sector.
Wikipedia kicks in
Attempts by Tajani's press office to correct the mistake came to nothing, as the Sunday Times did not publish a correction of the article.
The situation deteriorated further when online encyclopedia Wikipedia decided to pick up the story. In the English language profile of Commissioner Tajani, the alleged statement is the title of an entire chapter of his biography. It is immediately visible at the beginning of his profile, after the chapter on his political career.
Oddly enough, Tajani's team found out that changing wrong information on Wikipedia was even more difficult than rectifying it in a British newspaper.
"We tried to correct the chapter by adding the online version of Tajani's speech, where tourism is never defined as a human right, but the moderators of the page prevented us from making these changes," said Tajani's press officer.
Indeed, Wikipedia's rules prefer secondary to primary sources. A newspaper article is therefore considered more reliable than the original source, which in this case is the commissioner's actual speech.
The principle behind this decision is that Wikipedia does not want to become a propaganda instrument for politicians or interest groups, who could flood the encyclopedia with their press releases and statements.
However, "sources have always been a critical issue for Wikipedia," acknowledged a press delegate at the online encyclopedia. "The official source should be quoted together with other versions," he admitted.
But his is just one voice among many others. Indeed, the highly decentralised nature of the project makes it very difficult to understand who can ultimately make this decision.
Commission backlash?
The problem remains, and the possibility of misinformation, libel and defamation on Wikipedia is very real.
The matter concerns all online communications, where it remains more difficult to define responsibility and their echo effect can be even more harmful than traditional media, such as radio, television or print, whose mistakes do not last as long. Indeed, online information is often permanent.
The European Commission is not planning to sue Wikipedia for the misleading information, confirmed several EU officials.
However, "ethics in digital communications is definitely a subject which deserves to be addressed," European Commission spokesperson Pia Ahrenkilde Hansen told EurActiv.
