Media wars
James Forsyth 2:50pm
David Cameron finds himself caught up in a war between two media tribes following the revelations about the phone hacking at the News of the World during Andy Coulson’s editorship. On the one side, there’s The Guardian—whose scoop it was—and the BBC; for the BBC this episode is a chance to both make an ideological point against tabloid journalism and the Murdoch press as well as gain some revenge for the fun that The Sun and The Times had with the BBC’s expenses. On the other is News International with other newspapers that have used similar methods looking nervously on from the sidelines.
I suspect that Andy Coulson’s position is safe for three reasons. First, he is important enough to the Cameron project that the leadership will be prepared to expend political capital to protect him. However, the sight of this will make those back backbenchers who feel they were thrown under the bus during the expenses scandal even more bitter. Second, the majority of newspapers won’t want to follow this story too aggressively for fear of blowback; there are few papers that have entirely clean hands on this stuff. Third, I suspect most political journalists won’t want to burn their bridges with Coulson, who will maintain his current position through at least the party’s first term in government and most politicians won’t want to go to war with the Murdoch empire. I expect that Gordon Brown has no desire to see a return to the Labour versus the Murdoch press battles of the eighties and early nineties.
To be sure, today is not a good day for either Coulson or the Tory leadership. Being associated with this kind of story is not good for a political party. But the party took a calculated risk when it hired him after he had to resign over his Royal reporter tapping into voice mail and it must have known that the whole phone-tapping story would flare up from time to time. Unless something emerges to suggest that Coulson personally encouraged it, then he is safe. But this episode will further strain relations between the party leadership and the parliamentary party, many of whom will feel that Cameron is showing more loyalty to Coulson than he did to under-fire MPs.
P.S. Andrew Neil argues on his blog that ‘this story will run and run and run’
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logdon
July 9th, 2009 3:13pm Report this commentYou mean this fair and impartial BBC?
http://plato-says.blogspot.com/2009/07/harperson-and-dimbleby-double-act.html
NOTW Fan
July 9th, 2009 3:17pm Report this commentThe BBC are a disgrace, they can hardly hide their delight. Cameron should take note at how they are doing everything they can to smear the Tories. I hope Cameron completely reforms the media when he gets to Downing Street. To start with scrap the BBC and scrap the draconian libel laws we have in this country. It's these stifling Libel laws that have forced NOTW journalists to get stories by bugging people.
Chris Paul @chrispLOL
July 9th, 2009 3:27pm Report this commentYou think Coulson will survive? And not because he is innocent? But because he is good at his job i.e. sleazer in chief? So he will me in charge of making the case for the Tories being clean and bright, honest and changed, not sleazers? Is that it? I'd have to disagree.
Bocephus
July 9th, 2009 3:34pm Report this commentOkay, Coulson's now working for Cameron which I agree ties him in a bit, but remember at the last 3 elections the Murdoch press has supported Labour and Boris was one of the victims of this.
It is not as if this is a Tory conspiracy against Labour.
logdon
July 9th, 2009 3:43pm Report this commentPS Andrew Neil argues on his blog that ‘this story will run and run and run’
A bit like his baseball cap/vest interface with an asian beauty in the Eye?
Vulture
July 9th, 2009 3:47pm Report this commentThe terrier-like ferocity with which Neil is pursuing a story that is basically of interest only to Media types suggests he has a dog in the fight. His Masters' Voice? An old score to settle with Rupert? Perish the thought!
Red Rag
July 9th, 2009 3:51pm Report this commentLooks like Mr Cameron has over done the coseying up bit with Murdoch.
The longer Coulson stays on the more it looks like he will stick with his friends no matter what they do.....George Osborne anyone?
Insider
July 9th, 2009 3:53pm Report this commentDon't worry Murdoch plays the long game.........
oldtimer
July 9th, 2009 3:56pm Report this commentThe reason this may run and run will be potentially aggrieved celebrities trying to get their pound of flesh out of the Murdoch empire. We are short of facts at the moment about the numbers and personalities involved. Will the Guardian be more specific about names tomorrow?
We all know that newspapers get up to dodgy practices - even to the extent of printing forgeries or making things up - if it will make a good headline.
Usually, sooner if not later, the truth will out and we will discover if this has substance and legs or if this is a smear operation with different sorts of legs.
Beast of Grays Inn Road
July 9th, 2009 4:24pm Report this commentWhoever picks a fight with Murdoch does so at their peril. He knows where a lot of bodies are buried. Any attempt to trash News International will result in some pretty ugly collateral damage.
Fernando
July 9th, 2009 4:26pm Report this commentCan’t understand Andrew Neil’s blog. He cites a number of good reasons why the story has no legs and then says it will run and run.
I wonder if one of the problems is that freelance hackers gather information and then approach a newspaper if there appears to be a newsworthy story. Why is this any different from third parties sending confidential memos or disks containing all the unexpurgated MP expenses to newspapers?
The situation will be more serious if the NoW had commissioned someone to hack phone systems, just as it would be very serious if the Telegraph had commissioned someone to steal the expense disks. Perhaps it’s the problem of trying to prove this that lies behind the lack of interest by the MET, hitherto.
luke
July 9th, 2009 4:27pm Report this commentI think Coulson will survive, but what is definitley dead is the Cameron dividing line of Tory honest versus Labour Deceit.
There is no way he can use that with a straight face for a few months at least.
In many ways this couldnt come at a worse time for cameron. He has been trying to make integrity, honesty and leadership the key issue in british politics, and now he will have to resort to a few weeks of duck and cover to hang on to his loyal mate as press advisor.
Chuck Unsworth
July 9th, 2009 4:49pm Report this commentMurdoch operates and thinks in decades. Politicians work in Parliamentary terms. Murdoch will win out.
Nancy
July 9th, 2009 5:26pm Report this commentChuck so right so right, he plays the long game
b
July 9th, 2009 5:32pm Report this commentinsider - Murdoch does play a long game. Allegedly it is possible to link the following phrases-
F1 tv rights
German tv company
Murdoch shareholding
Bankruptcy
Lost money
Max mosely
Whips
NOTW
TimC
July 9th, 2009 5:53pm Report this commentSince the BBC is NOT impartial and balanced is it not time that we were allowed full-on PARTIAL commentators like those on Fox news?
Jeremy
July 9th, 2009 6:00pm Report this commentI honestly think this story is being inflated out of all proportion to its actual size.
So what is supposed to have happened? So far as I can tell, the Royal Correspondent of the News of The World - acting on his own initiative - did some voice-mail tapping. That, as I think most people will agree, was a pretty low thing to have done. When it came to light, the editor of the newspaper, who claims that he knew nothing about it, neverthless - being editor - took the responsibility for it and fell on his sword. Given the circumstances, if that was not an entirely creditable thing for him to have done, then I don't know what is.
So where and what is the story?
Flemingcrag
July 9th, 2009 6:03pm Report this commentThis Labour inspired attempt to get Coulson means any lingering hope they had of the Murdoch newspapers and sky t.v backing them at the next election have vanished. So, it will be all hands to the pumps at the Gruinard the Mirror and the BBC. That will guarantee the journalists votes only, judging by readers, viewers and listeners' comments of late they will be voting otherwise.
This Labour damp squib is the latest, since Labours' last damp squib. Clear evidence that the dividing line strategy of painting the Tories as evil is running on empty despite the best efforts of the P.O.D, methinks someone has given him the "stake" treatment.
AngloWelshDragon
July 9th, 2009 6:08pm Report this commentThe disappointment in Caroline Quinn's voice on R4's PM programme when the Met spokesman announced 'nothing to see here folks, move right along' made me laugh out loud!
What I want to know now is how this non-story ended up in the Guardian? Smells like dirty tricks to me.
mac
July 9th, 2009 6:13pm Report this commentChuck U:
Agree.
Amusing, though, to see the Labour groupies in excited hurrah mode across the blogosphere - even a rare appearance hereabouts of the reliably unctuous C. Paul. And the level of smugness on show suggests both hands weren't on the keyboard . . . .
Frank P
July 9th, 2009 7:07pm Report this commentLibel suits are more often than not sorted by the solicitors of the defendants/plaintiffs before court proceedings with a sooc. What's new? The insurers usually decide what the numbers are based on some pretty standard calculations. FFS give over! This is silly season frippery. What else is going on beneath the radar that requires this red herring, I wonder. When will these leftie students that now comprise government of the UK grow up? Jesus wept!
Oscar
July 9th, 2009 7:32pm Report this commentI have no idea why this is a 'Tory deceit' story - apart from Labour/BBC wishful thinking. I know, like many a guilty person, Labour supporters want the comfort of feeling they aren't the only sleazy party in Westminster and want to turn this into a McBride for Tories story. But it just isn't. There are no Tory dirty tricks involved here and no Tory deceit. And while the public may care about the royal family having their phones tapped I can't imagine they're bothered about Nigella Lawson (why?) or John Prescott. The public want to know what the pols get up to - they aren't too bothered about their privacy. This is a typical example of Brownite spite winning out over intelligent tactics. It will backfire on him - alienate Murdoch and enable Cameron to get on telly and that's always a good thing.
TGF UKIP
July 9th, 2009 7:33pm Report this commentOne thing that can be safely said about Coulson and his tenure at CCHQ is that he makes one realize just how good Alastair Campbell was.
On the other hand, being fair to him, making Dave and his bunch of metropolitan exotics acceptable to the broad mass of people outside the M25 and places like Sarrey, Sassex, Berks and Backs would probably defeat the talents of Alastair Campbell, Tim Bell, Gordon Reece and Maurice Saatchi combined.
CH
July 9th, 2009 8:34pm Report this commentLuke - How have the Tories been dishonest? All they've done is employ someone who may have been dishonest in the past but who the even the police (not usually backward in doing Labours dirty work) say there is no evidence for. It is the gullibility you display that this story was cooked up to exploit. wake up and smell the coffee, there is no way anyone is monitoring 3000 phones, impossibly expensive and if the NOTW had done it they wouldn't have had to make up so many stories. This is a politically inspired story and is really about Labour dirty tricks not Tory. i'm not saying the NOTW weren't out of order if they bugged even one phone, but to somehow blame Cameron is ridiculous. PS the real story is about honesty on the economy....remember the important stuff, not this distracting trivia.
strapworld
July 9th, 2009 10:31pm Report this commentI take it that it is now official Liberal Democrat Policy that one is GUILTY before being found INNOCENT!
They are quite disgraceful and that Huume should hang his head in shame.
Soldiers murdered on a daily basis and these idiots send them there.
Bring them all home and let the generals call Martial Law. Cromwell where are you when we need you.
Verity
July 10th, 2009 2:31am Report this commentTGF UKIP - Tee hee.
Strapworld, agree. Bring our military home. We will need them soon on the streets of Britain.
Matt
July 10th, 2009 2:17pm Report this commentBlimey, what a bunch of fantasists here. It's all a Labour / BBC plot? Not a story??
The NotW systematically engaged in illegal acts over a number of years (say, 10-15 phonetaps a week for five years = 3000 phonetaps), and they allowed it to happen because it was done through a third party, thus exculpating them as they saw it.
It's a bit naive to say "hang on, innocent until proven guilty" when everyone in the know is aware just how widespread these kind of tactics are. There are serious implications for Coulson, News Int'l etc as they went out of their way to emphasise how Goodman was a one-off.
Just like TV was done over for diddling viewers out of money for premium rate phone calls, and MPs have been done over for their expenses, now it's Fleet Street's turn.
Of course, if you feel that hacking into someone's voicemail, going through their bins and bribing a hospital worker just to get a story on a pop star is ok, then feel free to ignore.
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