I think one. I'd just add on to what the chief has said. I mean, this Inquiry, the reviews that have already gone on have indicated above anything else that even though there is a set of guidelines, which is the ACPO guidelines that most of us following, it ...

I would know very quickly.

But we do log all of our briefings onto the Spotlight Solcara system, which can be looked at, and again, I mean the media know themselves that it is an even basis. They would be the very first to pick up if they thought one was getting unfair treatment.

Sorry.

I would describe it as we have a number of ways of releasing information out to the media. One of them is a news line where we put recorded updates, and that news line is accessed by all media outlets, so whenever it's updated, all of the media outlets ...

That's correct.

Absolutely.

Yes, I do believe that any information that does find its way into the media is for a number of reasons, which I've outlined. I don't believe that we have an issue in any way of any of our officers or staff being bribed or paid for any ...

That's correct.

Absolutely, or there's a number of reasons why they will know the sensitivities around a particular case or individual or circumstances, and that it's dangerous to report on it at that particular time.

That's correct.

That's right.

No, I would say again with the local daily media and the broadcast -- the daily print and the broadcast, they will comply with what we've asked them, because we do explain the reasons. And they do know that if we've asked them, it is for justifiable reasons. We ...

Yes, we do.

I think probably an example of that was in this last month we had a murder in Belfast of a young guy and he was very well-known within the criminal world and rumours started very, very quickly about who was potentially behind that, who was involved in it, was this ...

The media do honour it and again I think it is building on what the chief had said about the strength of the relationship. It's a long-term relationship. They are very aware that if we ask them to hold back on something, that there is a very good reason ...

Absolutely.

The rumour had circulated for quite a few weeks and a number of different media outlets had spoken to me to say that they were picking up this rumour. Also, one of the media outlets had told me where they had picked the rumour up from, so I was aware ...

No, actually I was there for one year while he was there.

Absolutely.

"Off the record" to me means that it is contextual briefing, providing more information and information that cannot be discussed with anybody outside of the meeting or broadcast or put in print in any way. We would use off-the-record briefings -- and I'm not that keen in using "off the ...

I would expect them first of all to declare that they were having a friendship with the media. At the end of the day you can't restrict it totally but you would certainly want to be advised of it and the capacity of that relationship, but Northern Ireland is ...

No.

The boundaries are that they act at all times on a professional basis. Any meeting they have with a reporter or journalist is on a professional basis for business discussions and I don't believe that there is any scope for socialising without any business reason with the media.

Absolutely I would have.

Yes, that is my belief.

-- the media all together in an informal setting.

Yes, that's correct, and there was one other event in my statement as well, a summer event that we had --

That's correct.

Yes.

That's right.

Absolutely.

No.

And not even advise us, no.

Yes, that's as simple as that.

That's correct. And I think the expectation is the officer that's on the ground is dealing with an incident on the ground. Having to record details of conversations is not productive to them getting on with an investigation or what they have to deal with.

That's correct.

I think in general where the officer or whoever has been speaking to the media has been speaking just generally about the incident they're dealing with, so if we say are at a crime scene, and something has happened and the officer has given details actually around what has ...

(Nods head).

I think that is very fair to characterise it, and I think one of the difficulties as well, there are such sensitivities around a lot of things, and Northern Ireland and the history of Northern Ireland, that sometimes just actually using a word in the wrong context, a phrase in ...

Area.

The local media do have a very good understanding of the security situation in Northern Ireland as well, which sometimes can create difficulties, and they have been reporting on it for many years through many difficult times, so they are much more sensitive to having to maybe abide by some ...

I suppose the way I would best describe it is sometimes whenever they come in to deal with a situation or when they come in to Northern Ireland to report on a situation, it's usually of a critical nature. An example of that would be when one of our ...

No.

Either they will come into the office and have discussions just in the office and on a number of occasions we have met them either at their offices and those are in the formal meetings. We will sometimes have meetings where they'll ask to have a conversation with us ...

In the review meetings we will meet with them in a one to one with each of the titles or with each of the broadcast outlets and the reason being they may very well want to raise issues that are specific to themselves or specific to maybe anything that any ...

Well, like most other police services, we were going through a period of having to reduce staff, we were looking at effectiveness within the department and we used our internal process, improvement, you know, to actually come into the department and look at the key functions. As part of that ...

That's correct.

Yes, the press desk is managed by a press centre manager. I sit on the senior executive team where we meet on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday, so I brief in my team after those meetings of anything that has potential to be in the media or anything that we ...

That's correct.