Rupert Murdoch and the Corruption of the British Media

[Douglas Caddy]

Murdoch will have to step down

CNN founder and rival media mogul says News Corp head should take responsibility for crisis

By James Robinson

guardian.co.uk,

Tuesday 20 September 2011 11.00 EDT

CNN founder Ted Turner said on Tuesday that rival media mogul Rupert Murdoch would "have to step down" in the wake of the phone-hacking controversy that has thrown News Corporation into crisis.

Turner who has clashed with Murdoch repeatedly throughout his career, told Bloomberg Television: "I think he's going to have to step down. He hadn't survived anything like this. This is serious."

Murdoch, who is chairman and chief executive of News Corp, has consistently denied any knowledge about the alleged extent of phone hacking at the News of the World, which the company was forced to close in July.

Turner said: "Well, he should have known. He was chairman of the board. He's responsible. I took responsibility when I ran my company. You never heard me say 'well, I didn't know'."

Turner's rivalry with Murdoch is well-known. Although the American sold his company Turner Broadcasting, which owned CNN, to Time Warner in 1996, he continued to be involved with the cable channel at a time when Murdoch launched competitor Fox News.

Fox was soon challenging CNN for viewers and has consistently won a bigger audience share than the Atlanta-based channel in recent years, becoming a springboard for politicians associated with the Tea Party movement and the rightwing of the Republican party.

Turner's yacht was famously sunk in a Sydney-to-Hobart boat race by a vessel sponsored by a Murdoch company yards from the finishing line, an incident which prompted Turner to challenge the News Corp founder to a fight.

[Douglas Caddy]

US prosecutors write to News Corp as part of payment inquiry – reports

Justice department writes to News Corp to determine whether it violated US laws on foreign corrupt practices, say reports

By Dominic Rushe

guardian.co.uk,

Tuesday 20 September 2011 16.34 EDT

US prosecutors have written to Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation requesting information on alleged payments made to the British police for tips for stories, according to reports.

A confidential letter has been sent from the US justice department in an effort to determine whether News Corp violated American laws on foreign corrupt practices.

The US justice department said it had no comment on the report, carried by Bloomberg, which cited "a person with knowledge of the matter" as its source.

Shares in News Corp fell 1.7% on the news. The company did not return calls for comment.

It is believed the letter relates to allegations of payments made to police by News of the World staff in the UK. If staff were found guilty, they may also fall foul of American law, because the parent group is based in New York.

Under US law, it is a crime for a business or their employees to pay off representatives of a foreign government to gain commercial advantage.

"The inquiry seems to be following the typical pattern for one of these investigations," said professor Mike Koehler of Butler University and author of FCPA Professor blog. He said the US authorities would be interested in a "very broad spectrum" of News Corp employees.

"It's very typical for payments in these cases to have been made by employees of US firms who are not in the US and who are not US citizens," Koehler said.

News Corp, whose US newspapers include the tabloid New York Post and the Wall Street Journal, is already under investigation following allegations that victims of September 11 had their phones hacked.

This claims appeared in the Daily Mirror, a rival title to News International's Sun newspaper, and have yet to be substantiated elsewhere.

Nonetheless, the allegations are being taken seriously. In July, News Corp retained Mark Mendelsohn of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind & Garrison – an attorney who had previously overseen the foreign corrupt practices investigations unit in the US justice department – to help it deal with the phone-hacking scandal.

News Corp is conducting its own internal probe and has pledged to assist the US authorities in their inquiries.

[Douglas Caddy]

MPs summon Met police to explain bid to force Guardian to reveal sources

Deputy assistant commissioner to be called before Commons committee that investigated phone hacking

By Owen Bowcott, Vikram Dodd and Lizzy Davies

guardian.co.uk,

Wednesday 21 September 2011 07.09 EDT

The Commons home affairs committee has decided to summon the Metropolitan police to explain its actions, after its bid – and subsequent climbdown – to make Guardian reporters disclose their sources for articles relating to the phone hacking of the murder victim Milly Dowler.

The deputy assistant commissioner, Mark Simmons, will be called before the committee to answer questions this Friday – the same day his officers had intended to take the Guardian to court.

The briefing will be held in private, it has emerged, although the committee may issue a statement later.

The powerful committee of MPs has already investigated phone hacking and lambasted the Met for its failings.

Keith Vaz MP, chair of the home affairs committee said: "I have asked the Metropolitan police to give the committee a full explanation of why they took this action and to provide us with a timeline as to exactly who was consulted.

"It is essential that we get the full facts."

It came after Simmons, who is head of professionalism issues at Scotland Yard, admitted that invoking the Official Secrets Act in attempts to make the Guardian reveal its confidential sources for stories relating to the phone-hacking scandal was "not appropriate".

He defended the police's duty to investigate "robustly" leaks of information to the media.

But he said claims that Amelia Hill, one of the reporters who broke the scandal, could have incited a source to break the Official Secrets Act – and broken the act herself – should not have formed a part of Scotland Yard's strategy.

The Met had been due to apply on Friday for a production order to obtain all the material the Guardian holds that would help identify sources for the phone-hacking stories.

"The view I came to when I looked at the matter was that the Official Secrets Act was not an appropriate element of the application," Simmons told the BBC.

"We have acknowledged, and I have acknowledged, the role the Guardian has played in the history of what brought us to where we are now both in terms of its focus on phone hacking itself and indeed its focus on the Met's response to that.

"But in all the glare that's been thrown on to our relationships with the media, we have had to ask ourselves the question about how do we do more to ensure that public confidence in our officers treating information that is brought to them in confidence … is maintained."

Simmons said that, although he had been aware that an application was under way, he had not been aware of its detailed content or of the reference to the Official Secrets Act.

After an intervention by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), Scotland Yard abandoned its bid to force the Guardian to disclose its sources on Tuesday night.

Simmons said: "What I have clearly done is taken a view, based on consultation with the DPP [director of public prosecutions], based on, as I say, our own legal advice, that the use of the Official Secrets Act this time … was not appropriate, and that's the basis for withdrawing the application."

The statement put out by the Met announcing its retreat left open the possibility that the production order could be applied for again, but the Guardian's lawyers have been told that the police have dropped the application. A senior Yard source said: "It's off the agenda."

The Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger, cautioned against moves to curb responsible journalism.

"I just hope that in our effort to clean up some of the worst practices we don't completely overreact and try to clamp down on perfectly normal and applaudable reporting," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"This was a regrettable incident, but let's hope it's over."

The police application was formally made under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, but with an assertion that Hill had committed an offence under the Official Secrets Act by inciting an officer from Operation Weeting – the Met's investigation into phone hacking – to reveal information.

The Yard source said: "There will be some hard reflection. This was a decision made in good faith, but with no appreciation for the wider consequences. Obviously, the last thing we want to do is to get into a big fight with the media. We do not want to interfere with journalists. In hindsight, the view is that certain things that should have been done were not done, and that is regrettable."

Many lawyers had expressed astonishment at the police resorting to the Official Secrets Act. Their surprise was reinforced on Monday when the director of public prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, revealed that the CPS had not been contacted by officers before the application was made.

Neil O'May, the Guardian's solicitor, said: "This was always a misconceived application for source material. Journalists' sources are protected in law. For the Metropolitan police to turn on the very newspaper which exposed the failings of the previous police inquiries and reported on hacking by the News of the World was always doomed to failure. The Metropolitan police need to control the officers who are involved in these sensitive areas."

In a statement, the CPS said: "[On] Monday the Metropolitan police asked the CPS for advice in relation to seeking a production order against Guardian Newspapers.

"The CPS has asked that more information be provided to its lawyers and has said that more time will be needed fully to consider the matter. As a result, the scheduled court hearing will not go ahead on Friday. [The Metropolitan police] will consider what application, if any, it will make in due course, once it has received advice from the CPS."

The Met said in a statement: "The Metropolitan police's directorate of professional standards consulted the Crown Prosecution Service about the alleged leaking of information by a police officer from Operation Weeting.

"The CPS has today asked that more information be provided to its lawyers and for appropriate time to consider the matter. In addition the MPS [Metropolitan police service] has taken further legal advice this afternoon and as a result has decided not to pursue, at this time, the application for production orders scheduled for hearing on Friday 23 September. We have agreed with the CPS that we will work jointly with them in considering the next steps.

"This decision does not mean that the investigation has been concluded. This investigation, led by the DPS [directorate of professional standards], not Operation Weeting, has always been about establishing whether a police officer has leaked information, and gathering any evidence that proves or disproves that. Despite recent media reports, there was no intention to target journalists or disregard journalists' obligations to protect their sources."

The picture painted by Met insiders is that a relatively junior officer took the decision to take on the Guardian without consulting his superiors, setting off a calamitous chain of events that saw the Met condemned for an attempted assault on press freedom.

The senior source said: "There were not a lot of happy people at our place over the weekend because it was a decision made by the SIO [senior investigating officer]. There was no referral upwards, and you would have thought on something as sensitive as this there would have been."

[Douglas Caddy]

Exclusive: Murdoch execs told of hacking evidence in 2006

Police warned Rebekah Brooks practice likely to be in wider use

The Independent

By James Cusick and Cahal Milmo

Thursday, 22 September 2011

Up to a dozen News International executives, including Rebekah Brooks, were told in 2006 that the Metropolitan Police had evidence that more than one News of the World journalist was implicated in the phone-hacking scandal.

New information obtained by The Independent challenges the timetable, as publicly stated by Rupert Murdoch's newspaper group, of when and how it first became aware of the extent of illegality at the now-defunct Sunday tabloid. Senior figures from NI have repeatedly stated to Parliament that the company had no significant evidence until 2008 that illegal voicemail interception went beyond the NOTW's jailed royal editor, Clive Goodman.

The new evidence, which is likely to be central to the investigations into the Murdoch empire, reveals that police informed the company two years earlier that they had uncovered strong "circumstantial evidence" implicating other journalists. A senior police officer held a meeting with Ms Brooks in the weeks after the arrest in August 2006 of Mr Goodman and the private investigator Glenn Mulcaire.

The officer who met Ms Brooks – a former editor of the NOTW who at the time was editing The Sun – told her that detectives sifting through a vast cache of documents seized from Mulcaire's south London home had uncovered evidence that Goodman was not the only individual on the paper involved in criminal activity. Information was disclosed about the nature of that evidence.

Tom Crone, News International's legal manager, contacted executives from the company in early autumn 2006 informing them of the Met's meeting with Ms Brooks. The information passed on by Mr Crone to senior NI executives states that the Met investigation had gathered substantial "circumstantial evidence" that other journalists at the NOTW were involved in hacking phones.

It has already been reported that Mulcaire was in the habit of writing the name of the NOTW journalist who commissioned him to intercept voicemails in the top corner of his notes.

It has been confirmed to The Independent that among those contacted by Mr Crone was the NOTW's then-editor Andy Coulson.

The Labour MP Tom Watson, a leading campaigner on the hacking scandal, said: "If these allegations are true, then Parliament was not given the full facts of the case when senior executives appeared before MPs.

"We also need to know who it was in the Metropolitan Police that was informing News International of the conduct of a criminal inquiry that was taking place. How could it be that NI were aware of the conduct of a police inquiry almost in real time?"

The revelation that the upper echelons of the Murdoch empire were told of police evidence in 2006 raises questions about the persistent denials by executives that they knew phone hacking was being widely practised.

In July 2008, footballers' union chief executive Gordon Taylor received a £700,000 out-of-court settlement approved by News Corp's European boss, James Murdoch, following the discovery of a damaging email which suggested that knowledge of hacking at the NOTW went beyond Goodman. The deal included a confidentiality clause which kept hidden the wider use of phone hacking inside the paper.

As recently as this month, Mr Crone insisted there was "no evidence beyond Goodman" until negotiations in 2008, when Mr Taylor's legal team produced an email intended for Neville Thurlbeck, the NOTW's chief reporter, containing transcripts of Mr Taylor's phone messages from 2005.

The 2006 meeting between Ms Brooks and the Met also raises fresh questions about the closeness of the relationship between NI and Scotland Yard, which was heavily criticised for the failure of its original investigation to uncover the wider practice of hacking inside the tabloid, and the fact that no one at the NOTW beyond Goodman was interviewed by officers.

The former NOTW editor was in charge of The Sun at the time of the encounter, meaning she would have had no direct responsibility for how the Sunday title handled its response to the arrest of Goodman on 8 August 2006.

In her appearance before the Commons Media Select Committee in July, Ms Brooks nonetheless confirmed that her role involved regular meetings with senior officers, adding that she had been informed by the Yard in 2006 that her own voicemails had been targeted by Mulcaire. It is unclear whether the information implicating named additional NOTW journalists was provided at the same meeting.

The Independent understands that Andy Hayman, then the Yard's head of counter-terrorism who was in overall charge of the original hacking inquiry, was informed of the Met's meeting with Ms Brooks and that Mr Crone had subsequently informed key NOTW executives of the force's evidence.

Mr Coulson resigned following the convictions of Goodman and Mulcaire in 2007 and was subsequently hired by David Cameron as the Conservative Party's director of communications before resigning this January.

He was arrested in July on suspicion of conspiracy to intercept voicemails and making corrupt payments to police officers. He told the Commons Media Select Committee in 2009: "During that time [as editor] I neither condoned the use of phone hacking, nor do I have any recollection of instances when phone hacking took place."

Representatives of Ms Brooks and Mr Coulson declined to comment.

A News International spokeswoman said last night: "News International continues to co-operate fully with the Metropolitan Police Service in its investigations into phone hacking and police payments. We are eager to assist it in any way possible to ensure that those responsible for criminal acts are brought to justice."

A spokeswoman for the Met said: "The new evidence provided by News International continues to be considered alongside material already in the Metropolitan Police Service's possession. At the same time, all actions and decisions taken by the previous investigation are being reviewed. It would be inappropriate to discuss any further details regarding this case at this time."

Why chronology is crucial in this scandal

The closure of the News of the World has not been enough to quell the phone hacking scandal. A public appetite, a keen public interest, knowing exactly when the illegal practices began, is still there. Questions remain of who knew and what steps were taken, if any, to deal with criminality within.

Until now there have been key disclosures that from the outside take on the appearance of code-breaking, perhaps only of interest to a new class of Murdoch Kremlinologists. But the timing of what happened within the defunct Sunday tabloid has become crucial to this Fleet Street saga.

Two documents have so far dominated the who-knew-what timeframe.

The Commons culture committee regards the "For Neville" email as crucial. NI only decided in 2008 to settle, secretly, with Gordon Taylor, the footballers union boss, when Taylor's lawyers revealed that hacking went beyond one "rogue" reporter.

Tom Crone, NI's legal manager, was colloquial in his language to parliament: "Listen, it was the reason we had to settle the case... and we had to explain the case to Mr Murdoch [James] and get his authority to settle."

A year earlier, in May 2007, Clive Goodman, out of prison, wrote to Daniel Cloke, the company's human resources head, describing "other News of the World employees as clients for [Glenn] Mulcaire's solo subversive charges".

Goodman's assertion was that hacking was a culture at the NOTW. Now, despite subsequent open verdicts on NI-ordered inquiries with limited remits, and internal probes that backed the "rogue reporter" claim, NI can no longer pretend hacking was not endemic.

Nevertheless the battle for who-knew-and-when continues. The Independent's latest revelation pushes back the previous timeline by two years. It opens up a new line of questions that will be of interest to MPs when they next speak to James Murdoch and Les Hinton, who at the time of Goodman and Mulcaire's adventures was NI's chairman.

[Douglas Caddy]

Phone hacking: Dowler lawyer pursues US legal action against News Corp

Mark Lewis instructs lawyer of 20 9/11 families over allegations News of the World staff may have bribed police

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Friday 23 September 2011 08.53 EDT

The solicitor who represented the family of Milly Dowler in their phone-hacking claims against News Corporation on Friday announced he has teamed up with US lawyers with a view to initiating proceedings targetting Rupert Murdoch and his son James.

Mark Lewis of Taylor Hampton has instructed Norman Siegel, a New York-based lawyer who represents 20 9/11 families to seek witness statements from News Corp and directors including the Murdochs in relation to allegations that News of the World staff may have bribed police.

He says he intends to assess whether he can launch a class action against News Corp using American foreign corruption laws, which make it illegal for US companies to pay bribes to government officials abroad.

"There is a provision within US law, before you start an action to seek depositions from individuals, in this case, such as James Murdoch and Rupert Murdoch and other directors of News Corp," said Lewis.

He added Siegel would examine allegations of not just police bribery but also phone hacking and "foreign malpractices."

The move will be a fresh setback for News Corp which has been trying to insulate itself against contagion from the UK phone-hacking scandal that has engulfed its British publishing empire.

Separately, it emerged that this week US prosecutors at the Department of Justice have written to Murdoch's News Corporation requesting information on alleged payments made to the British police by the News of the World. The DoJ is looking into whether the company may have violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).

Under FCPA laws, American companies are banned from paying representatives of a foreign government to gain a commercial advantage.

The decision to co-ordinate legal efforts on both sides of the Atlantic comes just days after News International confirmed it was in settlement talks with the parents of the murdered 13-year-old schoolgirl.

News International is discussing a total package of around £3m including a personal donation from Rupert Murdoch of £1m to a charity of the Dowler's choice.

News Corp declined to comment but it is understood that senior executives question whether there is any basis for Lewis's actions.

[Douglas Caddy]

Phone hacking: News International paid Neil Wallis while he was at Scotland Yard

The former News of the World executive employed by the Metropolitan Police was secretly paid more than £25,000 by News International during his time at Scotland Yard, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.

Former Deputy Editor of The News Of The World Neil Wallis leaves Hammersmith Police station after being questioned by police over the phone hacking scandal Photo: WARREN ALLOTT

By Robert Winnett, and Mark Hughes

Daily Telegraph

6:17PM BST 23 Sep 2011

Neil Wallis, the former deputy editor of the tabloid newspaper, was paid the money during late 2009 and 2010 for providing “crime exclusives” including details of Scotland Yard investigations.

At the time, he was working as a police consultant working closely with Sir Paul Stephenson, the then commissioner. Mr Wallis was also paid £24,000 from taxpayer funds for his work at the force.

The details of his News International payments have emerged in billing records obtained by detectives investigating the phone hacking scandal at the News of the World.

It is understood that Mr Wallis was also selling crime stories to other newspapers during his time at Scotland Yard.

The legality of Mr Wallis, who was effectively working as a police employee, selling potentially confidential police information to tabloid newspapers is not clear.

Mr Wallis, who was arrested in July on suspicion of intercepting phone messages, worked as deputy to Andy Coulson at the News of the World during the period when phone hacking took place.

Known as the “wolfman”, he then became executive editor after Mr Coulson resigned before leaving News International in August 2009.

After leaving the News of the World he set up a public relations company and, a month after leaving journalism, was controversially hired by Scotland Yard on a two day a month contract advising the Met’s top officers.

He left the Metropolitan Police last September after damaging allegations were made in the New York Times which alleged that knowledge of phone hacking by reporters at the News of the World had been widespread.

When details of his employment by Scotland Yard emerged in July, it forced the resignation of the force’s two most senior officers, Sir Paul Stephenson and John Yates.

The Daily Telegraph has now established that during his time at Scotland Yard, Mr Wallis received payments totalling more than £25,000 from News International – including a payment of £10,000 for a single “crime” story.

Internal records obtained by the police show that he was paid for providing News International with details of a suspected assassination attempt on the Pope during his visit to London last year.

Last night, when asked about the News International payments, Mr Wallis’s solicitor issued a statement alleging that information about his client had been leaked by Scotland Yard.

Phil Smith of Tuckers Solicitors said: “I confirm that we have today complained formally to The Metropolitan Police over the leaking of information from Operation Weeting to The Daily Telegraph.

“We object to the publication of any story based on this information which has been obtained from a source with no authority to place such information in the public domain. We will be pursuing this matter further.”

A Metropolitan Police spokesman confirmed that Mr Wallis’s contract at Scotland Yard included a confidentiality clause, a data protection act clause and a conflict of interest clause.

All of these clauses would prohibit him selling any information he was privy to while working at Scotland Yard.

The spokesman said that, during his employment, Mr Wallis was not given access to any Metropolitan Police computer systems.

He was also never security vetted as he was always accompanied while inside New Scotland Yard.

Last month, it emerged that Mr Coulson, the former editor of the News of the World, continued to receive payments agreed as part of a severance package after he was employed by the Conservatives as the party’s director of communications.

The disclosure led to allegations that Mr Coulson had a conflict of interest during his employment by the Conservatives. He resigned as Downing Street’s head of communications earlier this year and has also been arrested as part of the police’s phone hacking investigation.

Mr Coulson and Mr Wallis were close colleagues and good friends and arranged for senior Metropolian Police officers to meet the Prime Minister’s chief of staff. It is understood that Mr Wallis also made informal representations to Mr Coulson about Scotland Yard’s views on Conservative law and order policies.

[Douglas Caddy]

News International 'continued to pay Neil Wallis after he joined Met'

Former deputy editor received £25,000 from News of the World publisher after starting work as consultant with police force

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Friday 23 September 2011 14.29 EDT

The relationship between the police and the News of the World has come under fire again amid revelations that Neil Wallis, the former deputy editor of the News of the World, was paid by the paper's publisher for "crime exclusives" while working for the Metropolitan police.

Wallis was secretly paid more than £25,000 by News International after he left the paper and got a contract to work two days a month as a PR consultant with the Met. One story earned him a single payment of £10,000.

The Daily Telegraph claims that internal records obtained by Scotland Yard show that he was paid for providing News International with details of a suspected assassination attempt on the Pope during his visit to the UK last year.

A spokesman for Scotland Yard said the contract it had with Wallis's PR firm, Chamy Media, "had a confidentiality clause, a data protection act clause and a conflict of interest clause within it".

He added that Wallis did not have access to the Met's IT systems.

The revelations that Wallis received money from News International while working for Scotland Yard will raise questions about conflicts of interest.

Last month, it emerged that Andy Coulson, the former editor of the News of the World, continued to receive payments from News International as part of a severance deal after he was employed by the Tory party as its director of communications.

Wallis's solicitor has made a complaint alleging that the police had leaked the information regarding the payments.

[Douglas Caddy]

We were addicted to Murdoch like crack cocaine, admits Jowell

The Indepent

By Jane Merrick, Brian Brady, and Matt Chorley

Sunday, 25 September 2011

Labour lost the confidence of voters after 13 years in power because it was addicted to the "crack cocaine" of courting media barons such as Rupert Murdoch rather than listening to the public's concerns, a senior member of Ed Miliband's Shadow Cabinet says today.

In a frank assessment of the mountain the Opposition has to climb if it is to win the next election, Tessa Jowell warns that "nobody is listening" to Labour because of a breakdown in trust with the public on the economy, its relations with the media, and a failure to talk about welfare and immigration. Voters can only hear "white noise", she says, and Labour must promise to open the "gilded cages" of the Westminster, media and City establishments.

As Labour's conference opens in Liverpool today, the shadow Olympics minister is joined by the party's policy chief, Liam Byrne, and former home secretary Alan Johnson in calling for Mr Miliband to apologise for Labour's mistakes on the economy.

All three senior figures, from the Blairite wing of the party, use interviews with The Independent on Sunday to urge Mr Miliband to "cleave to the centre ground" to win back the voters who handed Labour three election victories and be honest about mistakes made on the deficit.

But while the Labour leader is expected to admit there is a "long way to go" to repair the party's credibility on the economy, aides said the time had passed for him to say sorry for the previous government's economic legacy.

However, in a sign that the Labour leader is responding to concerns that the party has lost touch, Mr Miliband last night secured a deal to give 50,000 "registered supporters" a say in choosing the Labour leader. He said: "I want to change the party to make us more outward looking and talk to the public."

Ms Jowell will today build on her message in a speech to a rally of Progress, representing New Labour modernisers, by saying that Labour can rebuild confidence with voters by reaching out to communities "street by street".

In an interview with The IoS, she says: "What we've got to accept is that in the country more widely, nobody is listening. The biggest battle that Labour has at the moment is to be relevant and to be heard... For so many people, it's just white noise.

"If we are to become a more meritocratic country where there really is a sense that opportunity is there, if you have the initiative and the will to seize it, then we've got to open up these gilded cages."

Asked whether she believes the Labour government should have been more robust with News International over phone-hacking allegations, Ms Jowell, who was a victim of hacking and will be a core participant in the Leveson inquiry, says: "I think that the mistake that we made – it's a bit like the crack cocaine of politics, isn't it? Getting a good write-up, or the horror of a bad write-up. At its worst, Westminster politics is like a private conversation between Westminster media and Westminster politicians, and the rest of the world are eavesdroppers on a private conversation, and that's got to change."

In a sign that the party is desperate to make a clean break with News International, Labour activists will vote on a joint motion from the Unite union and MP Tom Watson calling for James Murdoch to quit as chairman of the group.

Under the party rule change, "registered supporters" will be given their own electoral college with 10 per cent weighting. The other three colleges – unions, MPs and MEPs, and party members – will have 30 per cent each. Multiple votes will also be banned, and talks will begin on allowing registered supporters to decide party policy.

[Douglas Caddy]

Phone-hacking claims mount up at News International• Former deputy editor 'was paid by NoW' while at Yard

• Goody among alleged phone hacking victims

• Coulson sues News Group for breach of contract

By Lisa O'Carroll, Ed Pilkington and James Robinson

guardian.co.uk,

Friday 23 September 2011 17.14 EDT

[Jade Goody arriving in Mumbai in 2008 to take part in the Indian version of Big Brother. Max Clifford said she believed a call she made from India to her mother, telling her she had cancer, had been hacked. Photograph: Pal Pillai/AFP/Getty Images]

News International is facing fresh phone-hacking controversies after a series of claims and counter claims involving half a dozen figures including Jade Goody, Alastair Campbell and two of the most senior former staff of the News of the World.

In just a few hours on Friday, it emerged the media group was facing five court actions including a possible action in the US targeting Rupert Murdoch and his son James, plus allegations that the Sunday tabloid may have hacked Goody's phone while she was dying of cancer.

One of the most damaging revelations was a claim that the former deputy editor of the now defunct tabloid had secretly received £25,000 from News International for "crime exclusives" while working as a PR consultant for Scotland Yard.

The details of the payments emerged in billing records obtained by detectives investigating the phone-hacking scandal at the News of the World.

The former newspaper executive Neil Wallis received the money in 2009 and 2010 when his PR firm Chamy Media had a two-day-a-month contract to work as PR consultant for Scotland Yard, according to an investigation by the Daily Telegraph. One story reputedly earned him a single payment of £10,000.

One of the stories he was paid for was about a suspected assassination attempt on the pope during his visit to the UK last year, according to the Telegraph.

A spokesman for Scotland Yard declined to comment, other than to say that its contract with Chamy Media "had a confidentiality clause, a data protection act clause and a conflict of interest clause within it". A spokesman added that Wallis did not have access to the Met's IT systems.

The revelations will raise new questions about conflicts of interest in public office. Last month, it emerged that Andy Coulson, the former editor of the News of the World, continued to receive payments from News International as part of a severance deal after he was employed by the Tory party as its director of communications.

Coulson, who quit the News of the World in 2007 after his then royal editor was jailed for phone-hacking offences, on Friday launched his own legal action against his former employer.

He is suing for breach of contract after the company notified his solicitors it was no longer going to fund his legal defence. It is believed this was communicated to Coulson's law firm as recently as August.

That Coulson's fees were being paid four years after he quit as editor will surprise many. He resigned as David Cameron's press chief in January and was arrested in July as the phone-hacking scandal deepened, with allegations that the News of the World had hacked into murder victim Milly Dowler's phone.

Pressure on News International continued to pile up on Friday as it emerged that the Met is to be asked to investigate allegations that reality TV star Jade Goody's phone was hacked while she was dying of cancer.

It is understood Charlotte Harris, the Mishcon de Reya lawyer representing several phone-hacking claimants, has been asked to represent her and to go to the Met with the allegations made by Goody's mother, Jackiey Budden.

Budden believes both her phone and her daughter's were hacked, but did nothing about it until July this year when she read about murder victim Milly Dowler's phone messages being intercepted by the News of the World. She could not understand how journalists were getting hold of information and, when she read the Dowler story, believed it could have been through phone hacking.

"She [Jackiey] will be going to the police. She believes her phone was hacked by the News of the World, and Jade's. Jade told me, 'I'm convinced my phone is being hacked'," said Max Clifford, who handled Goody's PR after she was diagnosed with cervical cancer in August 2008.

The solicitor who represented the Dowlers in their phone-hacking claims upped the ante significantly on Friday when he announced he had teamed with US lawyers with a view to initiating proceedings targeting Rupert Murdoch and his son James.

Mark Lewis of Taylor Hampton has instructed Norman Siegel, a New York-based lawyer who represents 20 9/11 families, to seek witness statements from News Corp and its directors, including Rupert and James Murdoch, in relation to allegations that News of the World staff may have bribed police.

"The allegations of phone hacking and bribery against News Corporation are serious and substantial, and we will approach this initial exploration with that same seriousness," Siegel said.

The legal action was just one of five that have piled up against the Murdoch operation in the past few days.

Also suing News International is Tony Blair's former director of communications Alastair Campbell, who is alleging his phone was hacked by News of the World.

His solicitor, Gerald Shamash, confirmed he had just begun legal proceedings on behalf of Campbell and two others – the agent of George Best, the football star who died in 2005, and Elliot Morley, the former Labour MP jailed for expenses fraud, who has just been released from prison after serving a quarter of his sentence for fiddling his expenses.

News International refused to comment on any of the developments, but said it was co-operating fully with all police investigations

[Douglas Caddy]

Sun has questions to answer on phone hacking, claims Labour's Tom Watson

Phone-hacking scandal 'far beyond News of the World', alleges MP, calling for James Murdoch to resign as BSkyB chairman

By Hélène Mulholland, political reporter

guardian.co.uk,

Tuesday 27 September 2011 07.48 EDT

A Labour MP has alleged that phone hacking at News International has gone "far beyond the News of the World" as he claimed that the Sun newspaper is also implicated in illegal practices.

Tom Watson made the allegation during an emergency motion debate on the phone-hacking scandal at the Labour party conference which called for James Murdoch to stand down as chairman of BSkyB in the wake of the phone hacking scandal that rocked Rupert Murdoch's media empire this summer.

The scandal took centre stage at the party conference on Tuesday morning as speakers took turn to lament Labour's past era of cosy relationships with media barons and called for measures to clamp down on bad practice by media companies and journalists.

Watson warned Labour activists that the scale of phone hacking at the now closed News of the World could be the tip of the iceberg.

"Do you really think that hacking only happened on the News of the World?" he said. "Ask Dominic Mohan, the current editor of the Sun. He used to joke about lax security at Vodafone when he attended celebrity parties. Ask the editor of the Sun if he thinks Rupert Murdoch's contagion has spread to other newspapers. If he gives you an honest answer, he'll tell you it's only a matter of time before we find the Sun in the evidence file of the convicted private investigator that hacked Milly Dowler's phone.

"This month we learn that journalists at the Times are affected by this scandal. The paper is shutting down its BlackBerry phone network – I hope they aren't deleting the records."

The emergency motion called for trade unions to have a role on the press watchdog and for the rules governing media ownership in Britain to be examined in the wake of the affair.

Watson turned on the case for applying the "fit and proper" test to News International, a company he described as "sick" with corruption and criminality from "top to bottom".

"Let's tell Ofcom what we think about James Murdoch," he said. "I wouldn't put him on the board of an ornamental garden. He's certainly not a fit and proper person to chair a major broadcaster."

Watson was among a number of speakers who hailed the leadership of Ed Miliband following revelations over the summer of how widespread phone hacking had been at News international, and contrasted it to Labour's past closeness to Rupert Murdoch under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

Watson, who received a standing ovation from delegates over his persistent questioning on phone hacking, said MPs had to "accept our shame of the blame" but that Labour had acted quickly in response to hacking allegations.

He said that hacking had been allowed to take place because of "police failure, a newspaper out of control, politicians refusing to act".

"There is no point in us glossing over it. We got too close to the Murdochs and allowed them to become too powerful," he said. "As a party, we got there in the end. When Ed [Miliband] got up at prime minister's question time and said what he said about the Murdochs, like you I thought, 'That is the leader I want'. This is the Labour party I want to be part of."

He went on: "Now our leadership must spearhead seeing the reforms through. It is not just about the News of the World or just about phone hacking. Murdoch should also tell us about the computer hackers, the people who left Trojan devices on computer hard-drives enabling them to read emails."

Chris Bryant told the conference that Labour's past relationship with the Murdoch empire was "not our finest moment" as he urged the party to "choose our bedfellows with a little more care" in the future.

Ivan Lewis, the shadow culture secretary, underlined Labour's new approach to the media mogul as he told delegates that Labour would create "tougher" media ownership laws and a register which could see errant journalists barred from the profession.

In a message to Rupert Murdoch, he said: "Mr Murdoch: never again think you can assert political power in pursuit of your commercial interests or ideological beliefs. This is Britain, Mr Murdoch, the integrity of our media and our politics is not for sale."

Lewis said the history of the relationship between Labour and the Murdoch press was a "complex and tortuous one".

"But what can never be complex or tortuous is the responsibility of politicians to stand up in the public interest without fear or favour."

Setting out his reforms, he said: "Never again can one commercial organisation have so much power and control over our media. In the period ahead, Labour will bring forward proposals for new, tougher cross-media ownership laws."

While a free press was "non-negotiable", Lewis said that with freedom also comes responsibility. "Neither the current broken system of regulation nor state oversight will achieve the right balance," he said.

"We need a new system of independent regulation, including proper, like-for-like, redress which means that mistakes and falsehoods on the front page receive apologies and retraction on the front page. And as with other professions, the industry should consider whether people guilty of gross malpractice should be struck off."

Lewis also said it was time David Cameron "came clean" about the appointment of former NoW editor Andy Coulson as his communications chief.

Bryant, a former minister whose phone was hacked, told Labour delegates that he hoped those involved in phone hacking and the ensuing cover-up would go to jail.

He hit out at those who had "lied and lied and lied" to parliament during the hacking investigation. Earlier this month, he claimed that he had tracked 53 lies told to parliament. But he said his tireless researcher had now tallied that a total of 486 lies had been told to parliament.

"I hope that people will go to jail for the criminal cover-up that happened at News of the World," he said. "But there is a bigger scandal, because it is the monopoly that BSkyB have. The fact that they've got 80% of the pay-TV market and 95% in the pay-TV market in many places. They can hoover up television rights, and hardly produce a decent programme of their own. That is one of the things that we should be dealing with – the monopoly at BSkyB.

Unite general secretary Len McCluskey pressed for a "long overdue" review of the rules governing media ownership in the UK and told the conference that there should be an element of "shame" in the party over the way past leaderships helped to "prop up" the Murdoch empire.

In a swipe at former premier Tony Blair, he said: "The Labour party needs to learn lessons – and they won't be learned by standing down by the banks of the Jordan blessing Murdoch's children."

"They will be learned by setting up the two commissions called for in this motion. One is for an overdue look at the rules controlling media ownership and the unacceptable concentration of power, of which the Murdoch empire is the worst example. And the second is to look at a still wider question – how independent trade unions are essential in ensuring that the rich and powerful do not get it all their own way. That they do not control our politics without the slightest counter-balance in society as a whole."

Miliband has pledged to work with Hollywood star Hugh Grant on media reforms.

The actor, who has become a champion for the Hacked Off campaign that is pressing for tougher sanctions and restrictions on the press, claims some newspapers will be "back to their old tricks" soon and questioned whether Labour MPs would still stand up to the media when the furore had died down.

Grant met the Labour leader on Monday night to press his case at the party's conference in Liverpool.

A senior Labour source said it was an "excellent meeting".

"Ed expressed his thanks for Hugh's work in the Hacked Off campaign and they said they would work together in future."

News International has hit back at Watson's allegations that staff on the Sun were implicated in illegal phone hacking and said if he had any evidence to suggest this was the case he should immediately hand it over to the police.

In a statement it said: "Everyone should act responsibly regarding the current investigations to allow the police to get on with their important work.

"If Mr Watson has specific information he should immediately hand it to the police and we urge him to do so. We are not aware of any evidence that the Sun engaged in activity as suggested by Mr Watson."

[Douglas Caddy]

Phone-hacking: NoW reporter Neville Thurlbeck takes publisher to tribunal

NoW's former chief reporter taking defunct tabloid's publishers to an employment tribunal, claiming he was a whistleblower

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Tuesday 27 September 2011 16.43 EDT

A News of the World reporter at the heart of the phone-hacking scandal is taking the defunct tabloid's publishers to an employment tribunal, claiming he was a whistleblower.

Neville Thurlbeck, the paper's former chief reporter, is claiming that he was unfairly dismissed by Rupert Murdoch's News Interrnational. There is scheduled to be a preliminary employment tribunal hearing in east London this Friday. It has only just come to light that Thurlbeck – who had been behind a string of high-profile exclusives at the News of the World – had been fired by the company.

News International said: "We will vigorously contest this case." Thurlbeck was arrested in April on suspicion of unlawfully intercepting mobile phone voicemail messages but remained on the payroll of the paper until recently, possibly this month.

Thurlbeck has been a key figure in the phone-hacking scandal – his name appeared on an email sent to private investigator Glenn Mulcaire which contained a transcript of messages left on a mobile phone belonging to professional footballers association chief executive Gordon Taylor.

This "for Neville" email took centre stage in July when Rupert Murdoch and his son James appeared before MPs who believed it was evidence they knew phone hacking was not limited to one "rogue reporter" at the paper. Both the Murdochs denied this was the case. Employment law experts say it is only possible to use the Public Interest Disclosures Act – which protects whistleblowers from losing their jobs – in particular circumstances.

Ruth Neil, of employment law firm Stone Joseph, said that there are "very specific rules" in terms of what an individual whistleblower can claim under the act. She said to use it as a defence it was necessary to have reported any alleged wrongdoing to another person in authority, such as a police officer or other public servant.

A source familiar with the matter said Thurlbeck's use of the whistleblower's defence was "an extraordinary tactic to deploy".

Neil said that it can be used as a defence if confidential information is disclosed about an employer, which is normally a breach of common law. If he wins his case it will also entitle him to unlimited damages. Normally compensation for unfair dismissals are capped at £68,400.

The sums involved in whistleblowers' cases can be enormous by comparison. An NHS manager unfairly dismissed "as a whistleblower" over plans to relocate cancer services out of his county was awarded £1.2m in compensation.

Last week Thurlbeck was at the centre of a privacy action in France relating to a 2008 "exclusive" concerning Formula one boss Mosley who was awarded £60,000 in 2008 after winning his privacy action against the Sunday tabloid in the UK.

In a separate development, Thurlbeck answered police bail along with two former News of the World journalists, Ian Edmondon, the paper's former assistant editor (news) and reporter James Weatherup.

Thurlbeck and Edmondson were bailed until March.

Thurlbeck could not be reached for comment.

[Douglas Caddy]

MP calls for editor of The Sun to be quizzed on hacking

News International denies claims of phone-hacking contagion

The Independent

By Cahal Milmo and James Cusick

Wednesday, 28 September 2011

It is "only a matter of time" before The Sun becomes the next Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper to become implicated in voicemail interception, a leading campaigner on the phone-hacking scandal said yesterday.

The editor of The Sun should be asked if his title had any involvement with the illegal practices of Glenn Mulcaire, the private investigator employed by its now-defunct sister paper the News of the World to hack the voicemails of public figures and victims of crime, the Labour MP Tom Watson demanded.

Mr Watson said Dominic Mohan, who has been in charge of The Sun since 2009 and briefly worked for the NOTW in the 1990s, used to joke about poor security at mobile phone provider Vodafone. Earlier this month, the MP also asked a former News International lawyer in a Commons select committee hearing if he accepted that the words "The Sun" were written on Mulcaire's phone-hacking records.

"Do you really think hacking only happened on the News of the World? Ask the editor of The Sun if he thinks Rupert Murdoch's contagion has spread to other newspapers," Mr Watson, a former junior defence minister, told an emergency debate at the Labour conference in Liverpool.

"Ask him, and if he gives you an honest answer, he will tell you that it is only a matter of time before we find The Sun in the evidence file of the convicted private investigator that hacked Milly Dowler's phone." Scotland Yard has so far arrested 16 people in connection with Operation Weeting, its ongoing investigation into phone hacking at the News Of The World.

Rebekah Brooks, the former chief executive of Mr Murdoch's News International, who was arrested in July on suspicion of conspiring to intercept voicemails and make corrupt payments to police officers, has insisted that The Sun was a "clean ship" when she edited the title between 2003 and 2009.

The actor Jude Law has filed a phone-hacking complaint against The Sun, alleging that four articles published by the paper between 2005 and 2006 were based on material obtained from his mobile phone during the editorship of Ms Brooks.

Law, whose on-off relationship with the actress Sienna Miller made him a favourite subject of tabloid interest at the time, is the first public figure to bring a civil damages claim for phone hacking against The Sun.

News International strongly denied the claim, describing it as a "cynical and deliberately mischievous" attempt to drag the paper into the hacking saga. In a statement, the company said: "The allegations made in this claim have been carefully investigated by our lawyers and the evidence shows that they have no foundation whatsoever."

Mr Watson also turned on James Murdoch, calling for him to stand down from the board of BSkyB and describing News International as a company "sick" with corruption and criminality.

In a statement, News International said: "If Mr Watson has specific information he should immediately hand it to the police and we urge him to do so. We are not aware of any evidence that The Sun engaged in activity as suggested by Mr Watson."

* Ian Edmondson, 51, the former assistant editor in charge of news at the News Of The World, yesterday had his police bail extended until March next year. He was arrested in April on suspicion of conspiracy to intercept voicemails.

[Douglas Caddy]

News Corp investors urged to drop James Murdoch from board

Shareholder group Pirc says Rupert Murdoch's son should not be director due to close association with phone-hacking scandal

By James Robinson

guardian.co.uk,

Wednesday 28 September 2011 05.10 EDT

Investors in News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch's media company, were urged on Tuesday to vote against the re-election of his son James Murdoch as a company director by an influential shareholder group.

Murdoch's youngest son is the company's deputy chief operating officer, the third most powerful executive at the company overseeing News Corp's European and Asian businesses including News International and BSkyB, and has been earmarked by his father as his successor.

Pirc, which advises shareholders on corporate governance issues, said: "In light of his close association with the phone-hacking scandal we are advising shareholders to oppose James Murdoch's election."

Pirc said in written advice on Tuesday: "We question James Murdoch's suitability as a senior executive and potential successor to Rupert Murdoch. As a senior executive at News International it is unclear why he did not initiate in-depth inquiries at an earlier stage and why former colleagues now directly and publicly contradict his stated position that he was unaware that hacking extended beyond [Clive] Goodman [the News of the World's former royal editor]."

Murdoch insists he was not told about an email which indicated that phone hacking at the paper was being carried out by more than one "rogue reporter", Goodman.

The News of the World's former editor Colin Myler and its head of legal Tom Crone have disputed this. Murdoch has been recalled to appear before MPs on the Commons culture, media and sport committee later this year to explain the discrepancy.

"Up until the closure of the News of the World, News International's response to the unfolding events had not been decisive and featured a number of arrests and resignations rather than dismissals," Pirc added.

Pirc has consistently opposed the re-election of News Corp directors with close links to Rupert Murdoch, the company's chairman and chief executive, including James Murdoch.

"Pirc's key governance concerns focus on the position of James Murdoch as a member of the News Corp board and the implications for minority investors of continuing dominance of the company by the Murdoch family," the group added.

Family trusts controlled by the Murdoch own 12% of News Corp but control around 40% of shares with voting rights, effectively giving them the power to veto any takeover bid.

[Douglas Caddy]

Daily Mail publisher challenges status of Leveson inquiry advisers

Concerns about lack of tabloid and regional experience among six members

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Wednesday 28 September 2011 05.45 EDT

The publisher of the Daily Mail has challenged Lord Justice Leveson over the composition of his six-strong advisory team amid concerns that the prime minister's appointees lack tabloid or regional newspaper experience.

Leveson indicated that he would consider whether to appoint extra advisers in response to Associated's complaint. The judge said that he would reserve his decision, noting that the "pressures on the Liverpool Echo will be different to the pressures affecting the Mirror and the Sun; different to the pressures affecting the Observer".

David Cameron set up the Leveson enquiry in July at the height of the phone hacking crisis. It is a two-part public inquiry that will first examine press standards and media regulation in the UK, and then look into the phone-hacking scandal once the criminal investigation and any court cases arising from it conclude.

Leveson told the early part of this morning's hearing that he was eager to engage with the Daily Mail and said he was trying to arrange for Paul Dacre, the paper's editor-in-chief, to attend next month. The judge said: "I did ask him to participate on 6 October but he can't, and I'm waiting to hear from him about 12 October."

Jonathan Caplan QC, representing Associated Newspapers told the hearing "we do not want to be confrontational" and stressed the importance of the judge's work, adding: "under the terms of reference [this inquiry] raises very important issues for the future conduct, regulation and ownership of the newspaper industry".

Leveson's six advisers, all appointed by David Cameron, are Sir David Bell, former chairman of the Financial Times; Shami Chakribati, director of human rights watchdog Liberty; Lord David Currie, the former chairman of Ofcom; Elinor Goodman, the one-time polictical editor of Channel 4 News; George Jones, former political editor of the Daily Telegraph; and Sir Paul Scott-Lee, former chief constable of West Midlands police.

Trinity Mirror, publisher of the Mirror titles; the Newspaper Publishers' Association, which represents the national press; and Guardian News & Media, which publishes the Guardian and the Observer, also expressed some concern about the lack of tabloid and local newspaper experience among the six advisers.

Associated's legal team also told the hearing that advisers to an inquiry may have a "partial view" and that could "filter into" the inquiry. However, Leveson stressed their role was only an advisory one. The judge challenged the view that the grouping had any sort of judicial role, noting that "the conclusion [of the inquiry] will be mine and mine alone."

The judge added: "I am very conscious that I am stepping into a profession that is not the one that I spent 40 years of life in. It is critiical that I obtain advice from those who have made their life in this area, not least because I would be keen to understand any flaws that I might have because of lack of experience."

Associated argued that the Leveson inquiry should have more advisers, and claimed the inquiry would "benefit from experts across the industry" that would "fill the gap" left the lack of representation for mid-market or tabloid papers.

The publisher's legal team also signalled it was particularly unhappy with the presence of Sir David Bell because he had been a "leading light" in the Media Standards Trust, which campaigns for high standards in news and organised the Hacked Off campaign for a public inquiry into phone hacking. Bell was chairman of the Media Standards Trust until he resigned to become a Leveson adviser

[Douglas Caddy]

Lord Justice Leveson: we need to pull together on inquiry

Judge leading inquiry into press ethics and behaviour also clarifies vision for seminars providing background information

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Wednesday 28 September 2011 09.04 EDT

Lord Justice Leveson has said he has a "vast and difficult task" ahead and needs to make sure everyone involved in the inquiry into press ethics and behaviour was "pulling in the same direction".

He told a preliminary hearing at London's high court that he wanted to learn as much as possible about journalism and urged all the barristers and solicitors in the court room to tell him if he was missing any "perspective".

It was "critically important through this inquiry that I have the help of everyone", he said.

Leveson added: "I have a cast and difficult task to address within a comparatively short period of time. I will only start to be able to achieve a sensible resolution … if everyone is pulling in the same direction, albeit from different standpoints."

At the hearing, he made it plain that he and he alone would reach his conclusion and make recommendations about the future of the press when he reports back to David Cameron next year.

He also issued further details about the dates and potential subject areas of the seminars he will hold ahead of the full inquiry.

The first seminar on 6 October will be chaired by Sir David Bell, the former chairman of Financial Times, and will explore issues relating to privacy and the press.

A second seminar has been scheduled for 12 October but no details of the subject matter have been released.

Leveson said a list of witnesses had been drawn up to appear at the seminars but the letters had not been posted because of a challenge by Associated Newspapers on Wednesday on the role of the "assessors", or experts, appointed to advise the judge. Associated is concerned that there is not an assessor with tabloid journalism experience among the six appointed by Leveson.

After some legal debate he clarified his vision for the seminars – unlike the hearings when the inquiry proper gets under way, those invited will be asked to speak informally and will not be under oath.

In each seminar, three people will give a 10-minute presentation "and then it is open to anybody else [in the audience] to contribute and add to the debate".

Leveson did not say whether the audience would be invited or open to the public.

The seminars will be recorded, streamed live on the Leveson inquiry website and transcripts will be made available.