12 ANNUAL REPORT 2014 However, we were left with a more fundamental problem. On one hand, DR employees ‒ as do other public employees ‒ have an extensive freedom of speech as long as they use it as private persons. On the other hand, DR is subject to a fundamental legal obligation to be objective and unbiased in its news coverage. Will the public be able to trust DR when, for example, Adam Holm one day as a private person condemns faith and religion in a feature article and the next day in his capacity of programme presenter acts as DR’s public face in an objective and unbiased discussion of the same issue? It is effectively a dilemma. As a matter of fact, DR already has guidelines in place for this issue which aim at achieving a balance between the conflicting interests and which we in this case accepted in principle. If only DR had followed its own guidelines, it would have been unlikely that the case turned out so wrong. But it did. The outcome of this particular case was that DR withdrew all its management reactions towards Adam Holm, and at the same time DR explained to him ‒ with the future in mind ‒ which specific parts of the feature article that had to be considered problematic for DR’s credibility with regard to objective and unbiased news coverage. So the slate was wiped clean, and DR initiated changes in organisation and procedure in order to avoid similar mistakes in the future. One can hope that the Adam Holm case has helped create more clarity and reflection, but there can hardly be any doubt that we are faced with a considerable problem. Not least in this age of the social media, there is ‒ also for journalists ‒ a very short distance between thought and word, and it is sometimes a difficult line that has to be drawn. DR must be able to safeguard legitimate regards for objectivity and impartiality in its news coverage, even if this entails certain restrictions in the private opinions that a prominent programme presenter may publicise. However, freedom of speech must always be the central element on which such safeguards are based. And safeguarded with a considerably more steady hand than in Adam Holm’s case. On quite another theme, there was the so-called MRSA case (Annual Report 2014, Case No. 2014-8) on whether or not access should be granted to a list of pig farms infected with penicillin-resistant staphylococci (MRSA). Was it possible to get access to this information based on the Act on Access to Public Administration Files and the specific Environmental Information Act? The journalists who requested access to the information thought that it was important for the public to know where the infected herds are. However, there were opposing interests ‒ for example the concern that the farmers and their