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A media scrum is an improvised press conference, often held immediately outside an event such as a legislative session or meeting. In the News: The Practice of Media Relations in Canada by William W. Carney. University of Alberta Press. . Some text available online.Washington Post: Canadian Apologizes For Expletive About U.S., by DeNeen L. Brown 28 February 2003, Page A17. Available online. Scrums play a central role in Canadian politics PressThink: Stephen Harper's Press Gallery Put Down: A Report from Canada by Ira Basen and also occur in the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia and New Zealand. In New Zealand, such informal press events are also called media stand-ups or gaggles.
Because of these concerns, politicians have sometimes tried to avoid the scrum in favour of more formal venues. Ryerson Review of Journalism: The 140-Year War Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day declined to scrum, instead holding a daily press conference. Brian Mulroney restricted scrums during his time as Prime Minister of Canada by positioning himself on the stairway up to his office. This allowed him to tower over the media on the steps below him. Scrum Wars: The Prime Ministers and the Media
by Allan Levine. Dundurn Press. . Some text [https://books.google.com/books?id=_3R8q8uOgkMC&pg=PP1 available online].
The media so resented this practice that when Jean Chrétien held a "staircase scrum" soon after assuming office, their reaction was so negative that he promised never to do it again.[http://www.embassymag.ca/pdf/2006/051706_em.pdf Embassy Magazine, May 17, 2006] : Brown-Bagging it for the Harper Family, Sean Durkin By contrast, although [[Pierre Trudeau]]'s relationship with the press was rocky, he was famously quick-witted and enjoyed deflecting — or returning — barbs from reporters. Many of his famous quotations, including "there's no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation" and "just watch me", were made during scrums.
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