The Zircon Affair
The Zircon affair concerned a BBC programme made in 1986 by the investigative journalist Duncan Campbell. It covered a secret defence project, an intelligence-gathering satellite named Zircon, and particularly the failure to submit it to parliamentary scrutiny. The BBC, under pressure from the government and its governors, decided not to screen it. After the decision was announced in January 1987, Campbell looked for other ways of publishing his scoop. On 21 January, the government obtained an interim injunction to prevent him. A group of MPs, organised by Robin Cook, planned a showing of Campbell’s film within the precincts of the House of Commons (in room W1, just off Westminster Hall, at 11am on Thursday 22 January) – presumably on the assumption that the injunction had no effect within the Palace of Westminster. The government appealed to the Speaker to allow a motion to be debated in…
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Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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