I'm intrigued as to why the media are escaping without mention - these are the ones who are offering to buy stories! If cheque-book journalism was made illegal then we may start to see facts, news and observations published instead of salacious gossip, sentsational 'scoops' and straight forward inaccurate specualtion.
If a story is newsworthy and reportable, the papers should certainly not have to offer large sums of money to print it - who knows, with decent, accurate articles, more people would buy a 'Newspaper' without the barons having to resort to such distasteful practices to increase daily sales.