Conflict between Climate Camp protesters and the press has arisen following apparent attempts by Climate Camp to restrict media access to their protests and the media's apparent lack of fact-checking.

Guardian writer Marc Vallée wrote on the paper's Environment Blog about his experience at the Climate Camp protest at the Royal Bank of Scotland in Edinburgh to decry bank bail-outs and promote environmental justice. Vallée reported that Climate Camp would not allow the media on site for more than three hours a day, hindering the ability for the news organizations to fully cover the story. "The camp felt it could control access to the land and decide who could or could not use it and at what times. A camper could take a picture at any time on a mobile phone, but a journalist could only take a picture between the hours of 1pm and 6pm and only with permission." The situation escalated into violence, as around 200 Climate Campers crossed police lines and smashed five windows. Several news sources, including the Digital Journal, claimed "an oil-like substance was thrown at buildings." Police wanted to further restrict the media once the RBS site became a crime scene, but they backed down once pressure was applied by the National Union of Journalists.

The story told from the point of view of Climate Camp is completely different from that of the Guardian's narrative. A rebuttal from Richard Bernard, a representative of the Climate Camp press team, focuses on the faultiness of the media's reporting. He states that there was no evidence of Climate Campers throwing oil onto buildings, and the media spread the information given to them by a police report without checking validity. "almost every media organization, from the Scotsman to the Financial Times, re-reported this despite no evidence of any kind having been presented to link this oil spill - if it happened - to the camp: no pictures of the spill; no traffic reports showing disruption; no bystanders or drivers complaining; no banner; no word from any climate activist on any website saying they did it. It appears to have been a phantom oil spill."

Bernard explained Climate Camp's closed policy to the media, stating that the protesters wanted their privacy. "That's not just privacy to plan acts of potentially illegal civil disobedience, but also just to have a shower or eat or sleep without press intrusion. That's why we opened the camp to media between 1pm and 6pm: between lunch and our evening meal." This seems a somewhat weak excuse to restrict the media; despite the social claims the activists were trying to achieve, the media has a professional responsibility to uncover the story.

Several ethical questions pertaining to the field of journalism come from Climate Camp's protest. News organizations must be unbiased recorders of events, and this instance not be swayed by police reports or protesters at face-value. Credibility is the key which gives news organizations their merit. But if Climate Change adamantly wants the media to perform higher quality journalism for the oil spill, than it should allow journalists the freedom to do their job.

Sources: The Guardian, Digital Journal