Jeremy Cronin has come out in favour of a media appeals tribunal, but says it should target publications and not reporters when things go wrong.

Fines, not jail, would be an appropriate sanction for bad journalism, SACP deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin says in a defence of the ANC's call for a media appeals tribunal.

Writing on the party's Umsebenzi Online website, Cronin says the penalty should be levied against the newspaper and not against individual journalists because the process of publishing is a team effort.

"Media stories, especially sensational allegations about prominent personalities, have legs of their own," he writes.

"Saying sorry after the event is just not good enough. Sorry doesn't undo the damage, whether the sorry is prominently displayed or obscurely tucked away."

Cronin defends the role of a watchdog press and concedes that the media have played an important part in exposing wrongs before and since the transition from white rule in 1994.

"However, there are times when watchdog zealotry displaces other roles of the media - like helping ordinary citizens with accurate information on matters that affect their daily lives," he says.

Cronin defines no-go areas for the proposed regulator including news balance or selection, what he calls the preceived "oppositionist stance" of major titles, media ownership and the alleged juniorisation of newsrooms.

The debate about the ANC proposal "should certainly not be about taming the media into being docile lap-dogs for the ruling party or government".

"Nor should it be about getting even with individual journalists, still less packing people off to jail. The stories of an individual journalist are seldom simply his or her work alone.

"From a collective news conference's allocation of assignments, through a subeditor's dodgy headline, to the general ambience of competitive and money-making pressures, what appears as an individual story in the media is essentially a collective, institutional product.

"If a tribunal is to have some teeth - say the levying of fines - then these should be imposed on the business and not the individual," he argues.

Cronin responds to concern that a tribunal appointed by South Africa's ANC-dominated parliament would not, in fact, be independent, and concedes: "It's possible, but I believe that the example of our Human Rights Commission and latterly of the Public Protector demonstrate a different trajectory."

"One thing's for sure... self-regulation on its own simply isn't working," he concludes.