David Cameron has promised to set up a judge-led inquiry into the phone-hacking affair, and, in particular, into the relations between News International and the police. He has not even appointed the judge yet, or published the terms of reference, but today we're going to get a dress rehearsal for the inquiry when four senior police officers give evidence to the Commons home affairs committee. The session starts at 11.30am and, as my colleagues Vikram Dodd and Paul Lewis explain in the Guardian today, this is a crucial day for the Metropolitan police.
First up is assistant commissioner John Yates, who will tell MPs that he did not examine any documents before declaring in 2009 that the Met did not need to reopen its phone-hacking investigation, which had closed two years earlier after gaining two convictions.
Yates appears before MPs on a crucial day for Britain's biggest police force, who are under fire for missing numerous allegedly criminal acts of phone hacking by the News of the World, and for some of its officers allegedly selling information to the paper which facilitated the hacking of the royal family.
A concerted Yard fightback saw Yates acknowledge to the Sunday Telegraph that his 2009 decision was "pretty crap" and admit mistakes, followed on Monday by the Met accusing News International of leaking to try to derail its corruption investigation.
Keith Vaz, the chairman of the home affairs committee, has just told the Today programme that he wants to establish a "timeline" so that MPs know "precisely what the officers did". I'll post more from his interview shortly.
In other phone hacking developments, Ed Milband is meeting the parents of Milly Dowler and other members of the Hacked Off campaign at 9am this morning. The Dowlers will give a mini-press conference afterwards.
Those are the events that we can predict. But, as we learned yesterday, this story has an enormous capacity to produce surprises. I'll be focusing on phone hacking all day and I will be bringing you all the breaking news, as well as the best comment from the web. I'll post a lunchtime summary after the home affairs committee is over at 1pm, and an afternoon one at about 4pm.
Keith Vaz (left), the Labour chairman of the Commons home affairs committee, has been giving various interviews this morning and, as usual, PoliticsHome have been monitoring. Vaz said some of the allegations involved were as serious as any his committee has considered.
Photograph: Julian Makey
The latest revelations that the details, personal details of a former prime minister, were obtained, the fact that police officers may have been involved in protecting members of the royal family and then selling that information on to journalists - these are all very serious allegations, the most serious allegations, certainly this committee has seen over the last few years.
Vaz also gave some indication as to what he wants to find out.
I think what the committee wants to know, and what Parliament wants to know, is a clear set of processes. What happened when and where, what were the facts, why was the original review stopped when it was, what did Mr [John] Yates do following that? I think most of these questions are in the public domain but we've not had an opportunity of putting them to our witnesses and I think that we need to hear from the witnesses when they appear. When they do we will ask them relevant, robust but fair questions.
In the Commons yesterday Jeremy Hunt, the culture secretary, said that he hoped the inquiry into the phone hacking affair would consider "blagging" - the practice of obtaining private information illegally, normally by impersonating someone on the phone. Hunt said blagging was "at the heart of many of the problems that we have been finding out about in the past week". Investigators were often only able to hack phones because they had "blagged" phone numbers and passwords in the first place.
On the Today programme this morning Christopher Graham, the information commissioner, made much the same point. He said that blagging was an offence under the Data Protection Act, but that it attracted a "rather puny penalty". The last Labour government actually passed a law bringing in a much tougher penalty, he said. But this law has never been enacted because of opposition from the press, he went on.
We really need to get a serious penalty in place to stop this happening ... Frankly, we need to say to people 'You will go to prison if you do this'. The serious penalty that is needed has been on the statute book since 2008 - Section 77 of the 2008 Criminal Justice Act provides for a custodial sentence of up to two years in the Crown Court, but it has been suspended for three years because of a stand-off between the Press and the politicians.
Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
Gordon Brown (left) has given an interview to the BBC about the revelation that News International journalists obtained private information about himself and his family. The BBC has just broadcast an excerpt, covering the moment when Brown learnt that the Sun had found out that his son Fraser had cystic fibrosis. Brown said: "They told me they had this story about Fraser's medical condition and that they were going to run this story." Asked how he responded to the news, Brown replied:
In tears. Your son is now going to be broadcast across the media. Sarah and I were incredibly upset about it. We were thinking about his longterm future. We were thinking about our family. But there's nothing that you can do about it. You're in public life. And this story appears. You don't know how it's appeared. I've not questioned how it's appeared. I've not made any allegations about how it's appeared. I've not made any claims about [how it appeared]. But the fact is it did appear. And it did appear in the Sun newspaper.
BBC News is broadcasting the Gordon Brown interview in full now. He is certainly attacking News International with gusto. I'll post the quotes shortly.
BBC News have just finished broadcasting their interview with Gordon Brown. Here are the key points.
• Brown accused News International of using known criminals to invade people's privacy.
News International were using people who were known criminals, people who had in some cases criminal records and News International as a result were working through links that they had with the criminal underworld. When people find out that the invasion of their liberties, their privates lives and their private griefs and their private thoughts and their innermost feelings become public property as a result, not of a rogue reporter or a chance investigator or someone saying something out of turn when they meet a friend at the street corner, but because criminals were hired to do this particular work, and these were known criminals ... These were criminals ,in some cases with records, in some cases with records of violence, and these links have now got to be explored. I find it quite incredible that a supposed reputable organisation made its money, produced its commercial results, at the expense of ordinary people.
And here are some of other points he has been making.
• Brown claimed he never had a good relationship with News International.
I do not think you can say I had a good relationship with News International.
• He claimed that News International attacked Labour because it refused to support its commercial interests. The papers from Labour's time in office would show this, he said. Asked to give three examples, Brown said that News International had an agenda in relation to the BBC, to Ofcom and to its own commericial agenda, and that Labour refused to support them in all three area.
• He claimed that he had only now become aware of the full extent of News International's invasion of privacy. This came out when it was put to him that he had a good relationship with senior News International executives when he was in office. "I did not know the level of criminality involved until now," he said.
• He insisted that he had always tried to protect the privacy of his children.
• He accused News International executives of abusing their power.
The record will show that some people at News International abused their power.
• He accused the Sunday Times and the Sun of invading his privacy. He said that he had complained to the Sunday Times in person and that his words had been misreported. But he conceded that he did not complain to the police at the time.
I'll post further quotes from the interview shortly.
Nick Davies's news story about the Gordon Brown interview has just gone up on our website. Here are some more quotes.
• Brown said that in two cases there was "absolute proof" that News International obtained private information about him.
I had my bank account broken into. I had my legal files effectively broken into. My tax returns went missing at one point. Medical records were broken into. I don't know how this happened.
I do know that in two instances, there is absolute proof that News International hired people to do this and the people who are doing this are criminals, known criminals in some cases with records of violence and fraud.
• He accused John Witherow, the editor of the Sunday Times, of failing to deal with "indiscipline" amongst his reporters.
There was no support going to come from the editor of the Sunday Times in dealing with the indiscipline among his reporters. This was a culture in the Sunday Times and other newspapers in News International, where they really exploited people.
• He said that he wanted to set up a judicial inquiry into phone hacking when he was prime minister.
I came to the conclusion that the evidence was becoming so overwhelming about the underhand tactics of News International using these private investigators to trawl through people's lives, particularly the lives of people who were completely defenceless, I thought we had to have a judicial inquiry.
However, as Patrick Wintour explains in the Guardian today, this idea was opposed by officials.
• Brown said News International were "distorting the news" for their own reasons.
News International pursued an incredibly aggressive agenda in the last year. News International were distorting the news in a way that was designed to pursue a particular political cause. This was an abuse of their power for political gain.The record will show that some people at News International abused their power. There is absolutely no doubt that News International were trying to influence policy. This is an issue about the abuse of political power as well as the abuse of civil liberties.
News International have put out this statement in response to Gordon Brown's interview.
We note the allegations made today concerning the reporting of matters relating to Gordon Brown. So that we can investigate these matters further, we ask that all information concerning these allegations is provided to us.
Photograph: Katie Collins/PA Wire/Press Association Images
Alan Johnson (left), the former Labour home secretary, told Sky News earlier that Labour did not set up an inquiry into phone hacking - as Gordon Brown said he would have liked to have done (see 9.34am) - because ministers would have been accused of exploiting the issue for party political gain. I've taken the quotes from PoliticsHome.
If I'd have ordered a public inquiry at the time, I'd have probably been castigated because in the run-up to a general election people would have said it was an attempt to get at Andy Coulson who'd been appointed by Cameron. So you can't take today's knowledge and just apply it retrospectively, you have to look at the information that was available at the time.
News International is also saying that is satisfied with the methods used by the Sun to obtain the information about Gordon Brown's son Fraser having cystic fibrosis, according to the BBC.
Originally Labour were going to table a motion for debate tomorrow calling for News International's bid for BSkyB to be put on hold. News International effectively scuppered that plan yesterday by withdrawing their offer to hive off Sky News as a separate company as part of their bid which - as they knew - meant Jeremy Hunt had to refer the whole bid to the Competition Commission, thereby delaying any decision for at least six months.
So what will MPs vote on tomorrow? On his blog Gary Gibbon at Channel 4 News thinks he has the answer.
Labour is cooking up a new motion for the debate tomorrow and thinks it has found a corker. Having originally planned to do something along the lines of delaying a BSkyB bid until after the police investigation, I get the impression they are now proposing something a little more cultural, addressing the relationship between politicians and the press perhaps? Anyway, it's designed to lure Lib Dems into the same lobby as Labour MPs.
You can tell when a British story gets really huge because it makes it onto Jon Stewart's Daily Show in the US. Stewart covers it wonderfully with his usual blend of comic indignation. Do watch the whole clip here. Interesting, the programme's account of the News of the World's antics (particularly in relation to the families of the 9/11 victims) provokes booing from the audience.
My colleague Marina Hyde has more information about what happened when the Sun rang Gordon Brown to say that it was running a story about his son having cystic fibrosis.
Are you insufficiently repulsed by the Sun's mysteriously-obtained exclusive on Brown's son's cystic fibrosis? Don't worry - like everything about the hacking scandal, there are always more details to emerge to compound the horror. I've been speaking to a source close to Gordon Brown at the time of the story, who recalls that it was served up with a chaser of threat.
"Gordon insisted - despite a heavy brow-beating from Rebekah - that he was not willing to let his son's medical condition be the stuff of a Sun exclusive," recalls this source. "So he put out a statement on PA to spike their scoop and make clear that despite his condition, Fraser was fit and healthy. The Sun were utterly furious, and Brown's communications team were told that if Gordon wanted to get into No10, he needed to learn that was not how things were done."
Yes, how DARE the then-chancellor refuse to accept that his child's health was not technically a commercial Murdoch property? I'd like to tell you there's a sick bag located in the rear pocket of the seat in front of you. But I'm afraid you're on your own.
Theresa May, the home secretary, has confidence in John Yates, according to Alan Travis, who has just sent me this from a Home Office briefing.
The home secretary, Theresa May, said today she had confidence in John Yates and that he was doing a "very good job" as the Metropolitan police's assistant commissioner in charge of counter-terrorism. As he prepares to gives evidence to the home affairs select committee on phone-hacking, May said: "John Yates is in charge of counter-terrorism. He is doing a very good job in that role. I have confidence in John Yates."
She also told a Home Office press briefing that she took "very seriously" any suggestion of corruption in the police. She had spoken to Sir Paul Stephenson, the Met Commissioner, as soon as the allegations emerged last week to satisfy herself that they were being dealt with properly, she said. "Any officer who is invoved in corruption or illegal activity of any sort in any way should be identified and dealt with according to the law," May said.
Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA
Earlier this morning Christopher Graham, the information commissioner, said that the punishment for "blagging" should be tougher than it is at the moment. (See 8.41am.) This is the practice that was used by investigators finding private information about Gordon Brown. Graham said that the last Labour government passed a law creating a maximum two-year jail sentence for this offence, but the relevant section of the Act has not been implemented. That was because of a stand-off between the press and the politicians, he said.
In 2008 Paul Dacre (left), the editor of the Daily Mail, gave a speech to the Society of Editors that covered this. And who did he praise for helping to ensure that journalists don't go to jail for blagging? It was Gordon Brown.
Here's the key section.
The fourth issue we raised with Gordon Brown was a truly frightening amendment to the Data Protection Act, winding its way through Parliament, under which journalists faced being jailed for two years for illicitly obtaining personal information such as ex-directory telephone numbers or an individual's gas bills or medical records. This legislation would have made Britain the only country in the free world to jail journalists and could have had a considerable chilling effect on good journalism.The Prime Minister – I don't think it is breaking confidences to reveal – was hugely sympathetic to the industry's case and promised to do what he could to help.
Over the coming months and battles ahead, Mr Brown was totally true to his word. Whatever our individual newspapers' views are of the Prime Minister – and the Mail is pretty tough on him - we should, as an industry, acknowledge that, to date, he has been a great friend of press freedom.
As you would expect, there is wall-to-wall phone hacking coverage in the papers today. You can read all the Guardian's coverage here. As for the rest of the papers, here are some of articles that caught my eye.
• Mary Riddell in the Daily Telegraph says that Ed Miliband has "the schmoozing impulse of a tortoise" and that he has no links with the Murdochs.
Ed M, an unlikely giant-killer, has the schmoozing impulse of a tortoise. While adept at emerging from his shell when duty calls, he would far prefer a Fabian debate to partying with Chipping Nortonites, including Cameron and Rebekah Brooks, the embattled News International (NI) chief executive.
Miliband is said to have "zero links" with the Murdochs, beyond once, as energy secretary, meeting James Murdoch for breakfast, at the latter's request. "That's as chummy as it gets," says a friend. Apart from declining to berate Rupert Murdoch over the quails' eggs at a recent NI summer party, Miliband, unlike Cameron, is a cleanskin. Hence his stand against a century of complicity that began when press barons and editors helped Lloyd George into No 10.
• Greg Dyke in the Financial Times (subscription) says he thinks News Corportation's bid for BSkyB is "dead in the water".
Whatever happens with BSkyB – and it is difficult to see the referral to the Competition Commission as anything other than the forerunner to the bid failing – the events of the past week mean that never again should we all be lectured by a Murdoch on how the media should be run. Anyone who listened to James Murdoch's self-interested lecture in Edinburgh in 2009 will be relieved to know the family's power is waning. Those of us who believe in the values of the BBC can sleep easier knowing that the Murdochs will never be as powerful again.
• But the splash in the Financial Times (subscription) says it is still not clear what will happen to the bid.
By ensuring that the bid now goes to the Competition Commission, Mr Murdoch's team hopes to remove the issue from the political arena until next year to keep the BSkyB bid alive."We are still going to be talking about this in 2012, but by then maybe people's attitudes will have changed," said one person close to Mr Murdoch, who is in London overseeing the company's reponse to the crisis. One government insider admitted ruefully: "It's too early to say it's dead."
But some believe Mr Murdoch's attempt buy the 60.9 per cent of BSkyB it does not already own can never recover from the tide of revelations about journalistic malpractice at his newspapers, the latest concerning Gordon Brown and the royal family.
• Michael Seamark in the Daily Mail asks whether the BBC's Robert Peston is too close to News International.
Media commentators have highlighted the close personal and formerly professional relationship between Mr Peston and Will Lewis, the very senior News International troubleshooter, amid suggestions that the BBC man is being used by the Murdoch machine ...Certainly, all the leaks have pointedly focused on the Murdoch regime of the past, particularly on former News of the World editor Andy Coulson who left the company some time ago.
Equally usefully, the leaks have also sought to try to distance Mrs Brooks and James Murdoch – Mr Lewis's bosses – from the relentless tide of damning revelations.
The home affairs committee has started taking evidence, but for the first half an hour they are taking evidence relating to policing reform. The phone hacking evidence won't start until 11.30am. Then we will have four witnesses, in the following order.
11.30am: John Yates, acting deputy commissioner of the Metropolitan police.
12pm: Peter Clarke, former deputy assistant commissioner of the Met.
12.20pm: Andy Hayman, former assistant commissioner of the Met.
12.40pm: Sue Akers, deputy assistant commissioner of the Met.
Clarke and Hayman were in charge of the original phone hacking investigation. They will be asked to explain why it was so limited, and why the evidence about the full extent of Glenn Mulcaire's phone hacking activities was not properly investigated.
Yates was asked to review the case in 2009 after the Guardian published new revelations about the extent of the News International cover-up. He will be asked why he did not re-open the inquiry then. He set out his case in a letter to the select committee released yesterday. At the weekend he also gave an interview to the Sunday Telegraph saying his 2009 decision was "pretty crap".
And Akers will be asked about the current investigation.
Photograph: Pool/Reuters
The internet domain name SunonSunday.co.uk has been transferred to News International, my colleagues at Media Guardian tell me. They will be posting a story shortly.
David Cameron (left) has just given a response to Gordon Brown's interview this morning about News International intrusion into his family.
My heart goes out to Gordon and Sarah Brown. To have your children's privacy invaded in that way - I know this myself, when your child is not well - is particularly unacceptable.
Cameron said there was now a well-resourced police investigation into the affair and that it would not rest until it had got to the bottom of what happened.
Just before John Yates starts, here are some quotes about him from politicians this morning. I've taken them from PoliticsHome.
Lord Prescott said Yates should stand down.
In less than a day, in three hours he said [Yates] had reviewed it and there was no evidence whatsoever. There is no evidence whatsoever that was just a big lie. They made judgements about not pursuing criminal actions that had been conducted, that is in fact is enough to have seen them moved out of their jobs.
Yates is still there, when all this evidence is coming out by Commissioner Akers, it is totally unacceptable that he stays in that job. Can't he find gardening leave which they usually find in these situations until we have cleared all this up with a public inquiry.
Conservative MP George Eustice said Yates had some serious questions to answer.
Why with all these 11,000 pages of evidence, knowing as they did that it was quite widespread why they didn't do a more thorough investigation at the time ... [Yates] investigated the cash for peerages allegations thoroughly and without fear or favour. I think it does look like there has been a different approach on this particular instance.
Ken Livingstone said he had been impressed by Yates when he worked with him.
Certainly, in all my dealings with him, he seemed a robust and independent officer.
Lord Blair, the former commissioner of the Metropolitan police, is one of the witnesses giving evidence to the home affairs committee before Yates starts. The MPs have just started asking him about phone hacking now. Blair was in charge of the Met at the time of the original investigation into phone hacking, but he has just said that he was not directly involved. It was not seen as an important inquiry at the time, he said.
Photograph: Lewis Whyld/PA
As the Guardian's Nick Davies has revealed, Lord Blair himself is thought to have been targeted by Glenn Mulcaire, the News of the World's investigator.
Blair has just said that he did not know if any police officers were taking money from journalists when he was in charge of the Met.
James Clappison, a Conservative, asks Lord Blair if he feels any responsibility for police officers taking money from journalists while he was in charge.
Blair says he was accountable. But that's not the same as him being responsible, he says.
He did not know about the wrong doing, he says.
John Yates (left) is about to give evidence.
Keith Vaz starts with a warning that giving false evidence could be a contempt of parliament.
Yates asks if he can start with an opening statement.
He says that concerns have been voiced about his interview to the Sunday Telegraph. In his interview he said that if he knew now what he knew in 2009, he would have taken different decisions.
He is sorry if giving that interview is seen as a sign of disrespect to the committee.
He has never lied to the committee, he says.
At his last committee appearance he said that the police inquiry should have been handled differently.
But News International have only recently provided evidence that would have had a "significant" impact on the decisions he made in 2009, he says.
Keith Vaz says that John Yates originally told the committee that there were only 91 victims of phone hacking.
Yates says he does not want to revisit the debate about what constitutes the crime of hacking.
Q: You said the 2009 inquiry was "crap". Are those your words?
Yates said he should have said "poor", but he did use that phrase.
Q: Who are you apologising to today? Parliament? The victims?
Yates says he is expressing "regret" that the police did not do enough for those who were potential victims of hacking.
But that does not mean that he is accepting responsibility for what News International should have done.
Vaz asks about the "inquiry" that Yates conducted in 2009. Yates said he was just asked to see if there was anything in the Guardian article that merited further invesigation. He had just a day to do this.
(In his letter to the committee Yates says this was not a proper review.)
Yates says it was "a poor decision". He goes on: "But we didn't have the information we should have done."
Michael Ellis, a Conservative, says Yates should take responsibility for not investigating fully. Why should he expect wrongdoers to cooperate with the police?
Yates says News International indicated in 2006 that they would cooperate with the police.
Yates says counsel went through the evidence collected as part of the original inquiry.
Mark Reckless, a Conservative, asks if Yates thinks the director of public prosecution should have reviewed the evidence.
Yates said it was a joint responsibility. The DPP did look at the evidence. But he came to the same conclusion as Yates.
Julian Huppert, a Lib Dem MP, asks if Yates has ever been approached by News International about his private life.
Yates says he hasn't. An article on the Evening Standard website about this was taken down quickly because it was libellous, he says.
Yates says if he has unwittingly misled the committee, "then that is a matter of regret".
Labour's David Winnick asks about Yates's relations with News International. When he last asked about this, Winnick says, Yates says he dined just as often with the Guardian as with News International. But the Guardian is not under investigation, he says.
Keith Vaz asks again about the allegation that he did not want to investigate News International because they had information about his private life.
Yates says that he can categorically say that this is untrue. This suggestion is "despicable" and "cowardly", he says.
Yates also says he thinks his phone was hacked in 2005-06. He does not know who was responsible.
Lorraine Fullbrook, a Conservative, asks what legal advice Yates took in the eight hours he spent reviewing the phone hacking case in 2009.
Yates says he looked at the existing legal advice. He did not take fresh legal advice.
Two or three days later the DPP did the same. He came to the same conclusion, Yates says.
Keith Vaz says Yates was asked to look at the "facts" and the "detail" of this case.
Fullbrook asks why it took three years to put the evidence on a computer database.
Yates says it did not take three years.
But the Telegraph article at the weekend said that, says Fullbrook.
Yates says that detail was wrong.
Bridget Phillipson, a Labour MP, asks if it is surprising if criminals do not want to cooperate with the police.
Yates says parliament might want to look at "production orders". If companies are cooperating, then the police have to respect that, he suggests.
Keith Vaz asks about the list of names of hacking victims on the Guardian website. Did Yates know Gordon Brown's name was on the list.
Yates says he did not know Brown's name was on the list.
James Clappison, a Conservative, asks if all the evidence in the "bin bags" containing Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks was read by police at the time of the original inquiry.
Yates says it would be better to asks Andy Hayman or Peter Clarke. But Yates was told it had been reviewed by counsel.
Q: Did this evidence show that other journalists had been involved in phone hacking?
Yates says he cannot answer that. He did not review the material himself.
Clappison asks the question again. Was there evidence relating to any journalist whose name had not been disclosed at trial?
Yates says the only thing he can think of is a reference to "Neville". This was taken as a reference to Neville Thurlbeck, the News of the World reporter. Yates says he has said before that this should have been followed up.
Labour's Steve McCabe says Yates does not come across as the "dogged, determined sleuth" the MPs were expecting.
McCabe asks about Yates comment about not going through the bin bags himself.
Yates says you would not expect him to do that. He has 4,000 people under his command, he says.
Keith Vaz asks Yates if he has considered his position. Has he offered to resign?
No, says Yates. If Vaz is suggesting he should resign because of what News International has done, "I think that's probably unfair".
Michael Ellis, a Conservative, asks Yates to confirm that he did not follow the evidence.
Yates says he thought the evidence had been followed.
Lorraine Fullbrook, a Conservative, asks Yates if he has ever received payment from a news outlet.
Yates says he has never, ever, ever received payment. He thinks the question is amazing.
Q: Have any of your staff received payments?
That's "highly probable", he says. The Met employs 50,000 people.
Nicola Blackwood, a Conservative, asks if police vetting needs to be improved.
Yates says that if vetting becomes an issue, then it will be reviewed.
James Clappison, a Conservative, asks how the public should be feeling about this.
Yates says the public should feel reassured that there is now a proper investigation.
Mark Reckless, a Conservative, asks how much the Crown Prosecution Service is to blame for this not being investigated properly.
Yates says there is a "joint responsibility".
Keith Vaz asks Yates what he thinks about the original inquiry.
Yates says that is a matter for Peter Clarke to answer.
Q: Have all victims now been contacted?
That's a matter for the new team, says Yates.
Keith Vaz says that the view of the committee is that Yates's evidence is "unconvincing".
• Home affairs committee tells John Yates his evidence is "unconvincing".
Yates has just finished. Before the next witness, here's a fascinating revelation from today's story in the New York Times about the hacking affair.
Separately, an inquiry by The New York Times, which included interviews with two former journalists at The News of the World, has revealed the workings of the illicit cellphone tracking, which the former tabloid staffers said was known in the newsroom as "pinging." Under British law, the technology involved is restricted to law enforcement and security officials, requires case-by-case authorization, and is used mainly for high-profile criminal cases and terrorism investigations, according to a former senior Scotland Yard official who requested anonymity so as to be able to speak candidly.
According to Oliver Crofton, a cybersecurity specialist who works to protect high-profile clients from such invasive tactics, cellphones are constantly pinging off relay towers as they search for a network, enabling an individual's location to be located within yards by checking the strength of the signal at three different towers. But the former Scotland Yard official who discussed the matter said that any officer who agreed to use the technique to assist a newspaper would be crossing a red line.
"That would be a massive breach," he said.
A former show business reporter for The News of the World, Sean Hoare, who was fired in 2005, said that when he worked there, pinging cost the paper nearly $500 on each occasion. He first found out how the practice worked, he said, when he was scrambling to find someone and was told that one of the news desk editors, Greg Miskiw, could help. Mr. Miskiw asked for the person's cellphone number, and returned later with information showing the person's precise location in Scotland, Mr. Hoare said. Mr. Miskiw, who faces questioning by police on a separate matter, did not return calls for comment.
A former Scotland Yard officer said the individual who provided the information could have been one of a small group entitled to authorize pinging requests, or a lower-level officer who duped his superiors into thinking that the request was related to a criminal case. Mr. Hoare said the fact that it was a police officer was clear from his exchange with Mr. Miskiw.
"I thought it was remarkable and asked him how he did it, and he said, 'It's the Old Bill, isn't it?' " he recalled, noting that the term is common slang in Britain for the police. "At that point, you don't ask questions," he said.
A second former editor at the paper backed Mr. Hoare's account. "I knew it could be done and that it was done," he said. Speaking on condition that his name be withheld, he said that another way of tracking people was to hack into their credit card details and determine where the last charge was made. He said this tactic yielded at least one major scoop, when The News of the World tracked down James Hewitt, a former army officer and lover of Princess Diana's, who had fled to Spain amid the media firestorm that followed the publication of his book about the affair.
And one other nugget before we get back to the inquiry. My colleague Mark Sweney reports that sales of the Sun and the Times slumped over the weekend.
Peter Clarke, the former deputy assistant commissioner of the Met, is now being asked about the original phone hacking inquiry.
Keith Vaz asks Clarke if he was hacked.
Clarke says he doesn't think so.
Vaz asks why all names were not thoroughly investigated. Are you amazed all these names have come out?
Clarke says he is not "amazed". He is not surprised by anything the media does.
Vaz asks if Clarke accepts that people like Gordon Brown have had their phones hacked.
Clarke says he does not know if Brown had his phone hacked. He is no longer in the police, and not involved in the current investigation.
Clarke says he only learnt about Milly Dowler's phone being hacked last week. He was "utterly appalled" by the revelation.
Q: Did News International cooperate?
Clarke says: "News International were not cooperative at the time." If they were cooperative, we would not be here now.
Peter Clarke is now reading out a pre-prepared statement about the original inquiry.
The police were originally called in in relation to the interception of voice mails in the Royal Household, he says. At this stage the law on phone hacking was untested. He kept the focus narrow to increase the chances of conviction. But the police were looking for fellow conspirators.
News International refused to cooperate more broadly, he says.
After the arrest of Glenn Mulcaire, a large amount of material was seized. As News International were not going to cooperate, the police could only mount a more exhaustive inquiry if they went through that material. They decided not to for various reasons.
First, compared to the wider terrorist threat, Clarke could not justify the expenditure. Going through Mulcaire's notes would have involved a large team of officers.
Second, a high-profile prosecution of a journalist, briefings to phone companies and briefings to the government would have dealt with the problem. These measures would have enable the police to achieve their goals.
After the inquiry Clarke wanted all victims to be contacted. This did not happen. This is a matter of regret.
London was attacked twice in 2005. In 2006 the police were investigating the plot to blow up transatlantic airlines. The suspects for this plot were arrested just after Glenn Mulcaire and Clive Goodman were arrested.
Clarke says he has been asked if the police could have come back to phone hacking later. That would not have been possible, he says. There were other serious terror threats to address.
If News International had offered "meaningful cooperation instead of prevarication and what we now know to be lies", the situation would have been different.
• Peter Clarke, a former police chief, says News International lied about phone hacking.
Bridget Phillipson, a Labour MP, asks Clarke if he thought that News International had something to hide. Clarke says he was.
I was as certain as I could be that they had something to hide.
But, because News International were not cooperating, he could only conduct a full inquiry if he went through the Mulaire archive himself. But, in view of the "life-threatening" threats his unit had to deal with, he decided not to do this.
In his view, he says, News International was "deliberately trying to thwart a criminal investigation".
Peter Clarke says the decision he took at the time was "perfectly reasonable". He had to weigh the seriousness of terrorism against invasion of privacy.
Breaking away from the home affairs committee for a moment, I can tell you that Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch and Rebekah Brooks are being invited to give evidence to the culture committee, according to the Tory MP on Twitter.
But that doesn't necessarily mean they will appear. If a witness does not want to give evidence to a Commons select committee, there is very little the committee can do about it.
Back in the home affairs committee, Peter Clarke says he started his inquiry with about 10 or 12 officers. But, on the day that they raided the News International office, 60 officers were involved.
Labour's Steve McCabe asks if officers "disregarded" the other names in Glenn Mulcaire's notebook.
Peter Clarke says that that is what happened. "The analysis of the 11,000 pages was not comprehensive," he says.
Labour's Alun Michael asked if any thought was given to getting the parts of the Met not dealing with terrorism to take over the investigation.
Clarke says he thought about this at the time. But he had already been getting other parts of Scotland Yard to support his unit. Some crime had gone uninvestigated as a result. It would have been "unrealistic" to expect another department to take over this case, particularly given the uncertainty relating to the legal advice at the time about the offence of phone hacking.
I don't mean it to sound trite. But it would have been a very difficult request to have made to colleagues.
Keith Vaz says that his committee remains "puzzled" that the investigation was not carried out more thoroughly.
Vaz asks why Peter Clarke expressed regret.
Clarke says he is sorry that people who have already suffered - he seems to be thinking of the Dowlers - are having to suffer again.
Before we move on to the next witness, some news from outside the home affairs committee.
David Cameron has promised to set up two inquiries, one led by a judge and focusing on the police's phone-hacking inquiry and one covering media standards generally. Labour want the judge-led inquiry to have a wider remit. My colleague Patrick Wintour has sent me this about
Ed Miliband in meetings with David Cameron will call for a wide judge-led inquiry that covers more than News of the World, and not just the failure of the Metropolitan Police to investigate the allegations of phone hacking at the newspaper. Instead he will call for the judge-led inquiry to look at phone hacking, and other malpractices at other newspapers, as well as look at the relationship between the press and police forces elsewhere in the country.
The Labour leader is due to meet Cameron and Nick Clegg to discuss the terms of reference of the inquiries either tomorrow evening or on Thursday.
Miliband will also urge for the Judge-led inquiry to look at wider issues of relationship between politicians and the media owners.
Miliband's aides claimed that Jeremy Hunt, the culture secretary, had in the Commons proposed a much more narrow inquiry that would look at News of the World. David Cameron at his Downing Street press conference on Friday said he thought the inquiry into the future of the media, and its regulation should not be conducted by a judge , but by a panel of experts.
Miliband was speaking after discussions with the Shadow Cabinet, and a meeting earlier with the Dowler family.
Miliband is planning to table a motion later today for a Commons debate on the phone hacking affair, and how the government should handle the competition commission inquiry into News Corp's planned take-over of BSkyB. Labour is holding discussions with parliamentary clerks to see if the motion is in order, and with the Liberal Democrats to see if they can attract cross party support for the motion. Labour had been planning to insist in tomorrow's debate that BSkyB take-over be referred to the Competition Commission, but Rupert Murdoch, chairman of News Corps, of his own volition on Monday switched tack, referring the issue to the Competition Commission himself.
David Cameron is in Cardiff today, where the cabinet is on an "away day". But, as my colleague Steven Morris reports, Cameron is not keen to meet the press.
Downing Street seems to be working hard to limit the opportunities journalists have to get close to David Cameron in Cardiff.
Even local accredited reporters are not being allowed into the "cwrt", the area next to the Senedd's debating chamber where members and media usually mingle and chat before and after debates. Cameron is giving a speech - on Welsh affairs - to assembly members shortly.
Assembly sources make it clear that it's down to Downing Street and special branch – nothing to do with them. "Security reasons" are cited by one Downing Street aide.
Television journalists are told there will be no organised shots of Cameron arriving – they are puzzling out ways of getting a shot from their office windows.
Andy Hayman, one of the senior officers involved in the original inquiry, is giving evidence now. Here are the points he has made in the last five minutes.
• He said that he took a job with the Times after leaving the police force because he had always wanted to be a journalist. It was not a pay-off for his handling of the phone hacking case, he said. He did not think of the Times as being part of the same company as the News of the World.
• He confirmed that he continued to meet News International executives during the investigation. These were "businesslike" meetings, he said. He had a media role as a representative of the Association of Chief Police Officers. It would have been odd not to carry on with these contacts, he says.
• He dismissed allegations that he was lenient towards News International to stop them publishing information about his private life. These allegations were "terribly grubby", he said.
• He said he was unconcerned about reports that his phone may have been hacked. The only thing anyone would have discovered was his "shopping list" and the golf tee off time, he said.
Michael Ellis, a Conservative, asks Hayman to confirm that he received hospitality from people he was investigating in relation to a criminal offence. Hayman says that's correct.
The MPs on the committee seem to find this surprising. Hayman regards that as normal. He says it would have been odd if he had cancelled the dinner, he says. Operational matters were not discussed.
Hayman says Peter Clarke was in charge of the original phone hacking inquiry. Clarke took the key decisions. Clarke reported to Hayman and Hayman would have endorsed his decisions, he says.
Hayman describes the scandal now as "a horror story". He says he is in favour of a judge-led inquiry.
Keith Vaz asks why Hayman ridiculed Lord Prescott for criticising the original inquiry.
Hayman says he owes Prescott an apology.
Lorraine Fullbrook says the public will see Hayman as a "dodgy geezer". The inquiry was a "disaster", she says.
Hayman says it was not a disaster. Two people pleaded guilty and went to jail.
Keith Vaz asks Hayman if he should apologise.
Hayman says he can only apologise for something he has done wrong, or something his team have done wrong.
James Clappison, a Conservative, says Hayman wrote an article in 2009 for the Times (paywall) saying that he "left no stone unturned" in the original investigation. He quotes from the article. Here's an extract.
In the original inquiry, my heart sank when I was told the accusations came from the Palace. This was not the time for a half-hearted investigation — we put our best detectives on the case and left no stone unturned as officials breathed down our neck.The Guardian has said it understands that the police file shows that between 2,000 and 3,000 individuals had their mobile phones hacked into, far more than was ever officially admitted during the investigation and prosecution of Clive Goodman. Yet, my recollection is different. As I recall the list of those targeted, which was put together from records kept by Glen Mulcaire, ran to several hundred names. Of these, there was a small number — perhaps a handful — where there was evidence that the phones had actually been tampered with.
Had there been evidence of tampering in the other cases, that would have been investigated as would the slightest hint that others were involved.
Hayman says he remembers being presented with around eight or nine foolscap pages. It was essentially a contacts list.
Hayman is not making a good impression. Nicola Blackwood, a Conservative, says that he sounds like a "tabloid journalist"
Lorraine Fullbrook, a Conservative MP, asks if he has ever taken money from a journalist. Hayman protests loudly about the question. Keith Vaz says it is acceptable. Hayman says of course he has not taken money from a journalist.
Vaz says he normally sums up after a witness has given evidence. But Hayman's evidence speaks for itself, he says. (It is not a compliment.)
Sue Akers, the deputy assistant commissioner of the Met who is in charge of the current investigation, is now giving evidence.
She says she wants to start by saying that the list of people who have had their phones hacked on the Guardian's website, which has been mentioned earlier, is not based on information from the police. It contains inaccuracies, she says.
She says that around 45 officers are now working on the case.
Sue Akers says she is taking a "very broad" approach to the inquiry. In some case, some people who have left messages on phones feel that their privacy has been invaded, as well as those people to whom the messages were directed.
She says around 4,000 people are named in Glenn Mulcaire's notes. The Met is now trying to contact them all.
Keith Vaz asks Akers if she has the resources she needs.
Akers says she thinks she does. The matter is constantly under review.
Having 45 people on this operation will not matter in an organisation with 50,000 staff, she says.
Turning away from the home affairs committee for a moment, there are a couple of key developments to report.
• News International has said it will "co-operate" with the culture committee, which wants Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch and Rebakah Brooks to give evidence. "We have been made aware of the request from the CMS committee to interview senior executives and will co-operate," a company spokesowoman said. "We await the formal invitation." But it is not clear yet whether this means the Murdochs and Brooks will turn up next Tuesday. The company have not clarified this yet.
• The BBC is saying that News Corporation are arranging a $5bn share buy back.
Back at the home affairs hearing, Akers has suggested that no one will be charged in the current investigation until October.
She also named the News International executives liaising with the police in the inquiry. They are Will Lewis and Simon Greenberg.
Sue Akers appeals to journalists or any others with information relevant to the inquiry to provide it to the police.
More hot news from outside the committee. Labour have released the text of the motion that will be put to a vote in the opposition day debate tomorrow. It's very simple.
This House believes that it is in the public interest for Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation to withdraw their bid for BSkyB.
Ed Miliband has chosen this to maximise Lib Dem support. A Miliband aide has just told me the party hopes for "overwhelming support"
If MPs pass this motion, it won't technically have much effect. Murdoch isn't a British citizen, and the House of Commons cannot tell him what to do. In theory, it should not even be relevant to the Competition Commission inquiry into whether the bid should go through. All I can say at this stage is that a Commons vote of that kind won't increase the chances of the News Corp bid being successful.
The Tories won't want to vote against this motion (not least because, according a YouGov poll at the weekend [pdf], 70% of the public are opposed to the bid going through - and only 9% are in favour). They could abstain, but that would look weak and it would allow the motion to go through anyway. But they can table an amendment. We'll find out more shortly.
At the end of her evidence, Sue Akers said that the police had only contacted 173 of the 4,000-odd people named in Glenn Mulcaire's files.
The hearing is over now. I'll post a summary shortly.
My colleague Graeme Wearden has more details about the $5bn share buyback scheme announced by News Corp in the last hour. (See 2.07pm)
News Corp was already planning to repurchase $1.8bn of new shares, but the announcement that this programme is being increased to $5bn over the next year is a surprise. News Corp shares have fallen by around 14% since the phone hacking crisis broke - Murdoch must be under pressure to halt this slide and placate his US investor base.The instant view in the Guardian newsroom is that this cash splurge does not mean that the BSkyB bid is dead. News Corp has a healthy cash flow, and plenty of cash on its balance sheet too. Plus, the company could always borrow money to fund the takeover in the future if needed.
The news has been well received on Wall Street, where News Corp shares were up 5% at the start of trading. BSkyB shares are little moved, at 702p.
Share buybacks are a popular way of returning money to investors without depressing the share price. They also typically result in higher dividend payments (as future earnings are split between fewer shares).
Here's an early afternoon summary.
• Ed Miliband has announced that Labour will invite the House of Commons to vote against Rupert Murdoch buying the whole of BSkyB. Labour have tabled a motion saying that this House believes that "it is in the public interest for Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation to withdraw their bid for BSkyB". A Labour win would not be binding on Murdoch, or the Competition Commission considering the bid, but Miliband has just told the BBC that he thinks a vote in favour would make it easier for Jeremy Hunt, the culture secretary, to block the bid. As I write, it is not clear how Conservative and Lib Dems will vote.
• News International has been strongly attacked by the police officer who led the original investigation into phone hacking. Peter Clarke, a former deputy assistant commissioner, told the Commons home affairs committee: "If at any time News International had offered some meaningful co-operation instead of prevarication and what we now know to be lies, we would not be here today." Clarke admitted that Glenn Mulcaire's notebooks were not thoroughly investigated at the time, but he said that, with News International refusing to cooperate with the phone hacking inquiry, he took the decision that the anti-terrorism unit that he led had more important priorities. "In the wider context of counter-terrorist operations that posed an immediate threat to the British public, when set against the criminal course of conduct that involved gross breaches of privacy but no apparent threat of physical harm to the public, I could not justify the huge expenditure of resources this would entail over an inevitably protracted period," Clarke said. Clarke was one of four former and serving officers giving evidence to the committee about the affair. The MPs seemed to be unimpressed by Andy Hayman, Clarke's immediate superior, and John Yates. Sue Akers, who is in charge of the new investigation, was given a warmer reception, although she did also say that only 173 of the 4,000-odd people named in Glenn Mulcaire's notes have been contacted by the police.
• Gordon Brown has launched a passionate attack on News International for using known criminals to invade the privacy of his family and others. I had my bank account broken into. I had my legal files effectively broken into. My tax returns went missing at one point. Medical records were broken into," he said. "I do know that in two instances there is absolute proof that News International hired people to do this and the people who are doing this are criminals, known criminals in some cases with records of violence and fraud."
• The Commons culture committee has invited Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch and Rebekah Brooks to give evidence to it on Tuesday next week. John Whittingdale, the chairman of the committee, said: "In light of the extraordinary developments this week around phone hacking, serious questions have arisen about the evidence given to the Committee by a number of witnesses in its previous inquiry into press standards, libel and privacy. In particular James Murdoch has said that Parliament was misled. That is a very serious matter that we will not allow to go unquestioned. We are therefore today calling James Murdoch, Rupert Murdoch, and Rebekah Brooks to appear before us next week." News International has said it will "co-operate" with the committee, but it has not explained yet whether this means the Murdochs and Brooks will actually show up. (See 2.07pm.)
• Ed Miliband has said that he wants the judge-led inquiry being set up by the government to cover media misconduct in general. Speaking after meeting the parents of Milly Dowler, he said he would oppose attempts to give it a narrow remit. Miliband, David Cameron and Nick Clegg are meeting tonight to discuss the terms of reference of the inquiry in more detail.
• News Corporation has announced a $5bn share buyback. Essentially it's the companies means of shoring up the share price. (See 2.48pm.)
John Cassidy is the latest writer to speculate about Rupert Murdoch giving up newspapers. Here's an extract from his post on the New Yorker blog.
For Murdoch to abandon Fleet Street after almost sixty years of involvement would come as a great shock to many, myself included, but I no longer think it can be ruled out as a possibility. (From 1986 to 1995, I held a variety of positions at two Murdoch newspapers: the Sunday Times and the New York Post.)
From a business perspective, ditching the newspapers would be an eminently defendable move. In recent years, they have contributed relatively little to News Corp.'s profits. Without them, News Corp. would be free to press its effort to purchase the entirety of British Sky Broadcasting, the dominant British satellite-television company, in which it owns a thirty-nine per cent stake. Murdoch and his son James have spent more than twenty years building up BSkyB, which is now minting money.
Here's Ed Miliband's statement on the Labour motion tabled for debate tomorrow. (See 2.15pm and 3.20pm.)
There are times when the House of Commons has got to rise to the occasion and speak for the public.We have said that the purchase of BSkyB should not proceed until after criminal inquiries are complete.
The simplest way to achieve this is for Rupert Murdoch to recognise the feelings of the public and the will of the House of Commons and withdraw this bid.
I am calling on Parliament to show its will tomorrow.
On Twitter someone points out that notwmovie.com was registered as an internet domain name two days ago. Who's going to play Rebekah?
The phone hacking affair is already changing the way journalism is taught. My colleague Jessica Shepherd has sent me this.
Professor George Brock, head of City University's journalism department and a former managing editor of The Times, says the ethics component of courses is likely to be given greater prominence. "Modules on subjects like history of journalism and "journalism and society" are constantly being updated and of course phone-hacking will be mentioned," he says. "We teach ethics in varying forms across most courses and phone-hacking is likely to raise the prominence of these issues."
Ros Coward, professor of journalism at Roehampton University, agrees that teaching ethics will be even more important now. "It has always been considered important, but this is going to step up how important it is," she says. She says the phone-hacking scandal has proven how important it is for would-be journalists to be properly trained.
Ethics forms a major part of most - if not all - journalism courses. What about how the revelations of phone-hacking will be taught? Tim Luckhurst, professor of journalism at the University of Kent, says they will be studied in the History of Journalism module alongside topics such as the failure of British Journalism during World War 1, the era of the Press Barons and Geoffrey Dawson's censorship of his Berlin Correspondent during the era of appeasement.
The quote from Luckhurst is particularly damning. He lists three of the great low-points of British journalism. Now he has a fourth to add to his list.
In the light of today's Guardian story about the way a decision by a judge six years ago not to go ahead with a court case effectively concealed evidence about Gordon Brown's data being illegally targeted, Ben Bradshaw, the former Labour culture secretary, has revealed that he is writing to the Lord Chief Justice demanding an explanation.
I've already mentioned the Daily Show. (See 10.15am.) Now I see that this story has also made it onto the Simpsons. According to the Telegraph, a reference to a tycoon character called Montgomery Burns - described as "a hateful man nobody likes" - for some mysterious reason rang a bell with viewers.
The government will support Labour tomorrow in the Murdoch debate, the BBC reports.
That's significant. It means the Commons is going to vote against Murdoch taking over BSkyB.
• MPs expected to vote against Rupert Murdoch taking over BSkyB. With Labour and the government in favour, the motion - "This House believes that it is in the public interest for Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation to withdraw their bid for BSkyB" - may well go through unopposed.
Here are some instant thoughts on the news that the House of Commons will tomorrow pass a motion opposing the News Corporation bid for BSkyB. (See 4.05pm.)
• Ed Miliband is on a roll. By general consent, the Labour leader has handled this crisis well but this is his most impressive triumph to date. He tabled the motion, challenging David Cameron to either support him - or find himself on the wrong side of public opinion.
• BSkyB's share price has gone down within the last few minutes in the light of the news. The vote is not binding on Murdoch, or even the government, and in theory it should have no impact on the Competition Commission's assessment of the News Corp bid for BSkyB (which ought to be decided by technical competition law criteria). But in practice you can't entirely take politics out of these decisions. At the very least a vote in the House of Commons against the bid won't help Murdoch.
• David Cameron is engaged in damage limitation. Last week, at PMQs, Ben Bradshaw suggested that Cameron should block the takeover on the grounds that News Corporation's assurances could not be trusted. Using a phrase that was seen by some as a jibe at Bradshaw's homosexuality, Cameron mocked the idea.
If you do not follow the correct legal processes, you will be judicially reviewed, and all the decisions that you would like to make from a political point of view will be struck down in the courts. You would look pretty for a day, but useless for a week.
This week Cameron's stance is very different. Although the government has not abandoned its commitment to the "correct legal processes", the man who did not want to express a view on the News Corp bid last week is now telling his MPs to go through the Commons lobbies to vote against it.
• Politicians are following the polls. They must have noticed that this bid is deeply unpopular with the public. According to a YouGov poll at the weekend (pdf), only 9% of people think the bid should be allowed. Another 70% of people want it blocked, and the rest don't know. A majority of respondents also say they want the decision about the bid to take into account the phone hacking affair.
Here's the Guardian video of Peter Clarke, the former Met officer who was in charge of the original phone hacking inquiry, accusing News International of failing to cooperate with the police.
Here are some more quotes from what Clarke actually said.
If at any time News International had offered some meaningful co-operation instead of lies, we would not be here today ...Would you expect criminals to co-operate with the police? Of course you don't. But this is slightly different - and I don't mean to be flippant - from someone taking the lead off the church roof. This is a major global organisation with access to the best legal advice, in my view deliberately trying to thwart a police investigation.
Investors certainly think the Commons vote tomorrow is signficant, even if the rest of us can't be quite sure yet what significance it will have. (See 4.13pm.) BSkyB shares fell by about 2.5% after the news broke, although they subsequently bounced up a bit and they are now just down by about 1.5%.
Robert Tait, a former Guardian correspondent in Tehran and Istanbul, has written an interesting blog about his time as a journalist on the Sunday Times's office in Scotland. Here's an extract.
The "Sunday Times" was no place for shrinking violets and there were practices there that struck me as, to put it mildly, distinctive. It was possible, for example, to obtain unlisted phone numbers as long as you knew a person's address, something obtained from the electoral roll, which could be accessed online. Getting such information quickly became routine. It occurred to me at the time -- and does so even more strongly now -- that if such resources were available to a branch office, what additional means were being deployed at its Wapping headquarters in London?
Here's an evening summary.
• Downing Street has announced that the government will support a Labour motion tomorrow opposing News Corporation's bid for BSkyB. The motion - saying "This House believes that it is in the public interest for Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation to withdraw their bid for BSkyB" - may well go through unopposed. BSkyB shares fell after the news broke, and the vote certainly won't help the longterm prospects of the bid going through. But it probably won't do it much damage to it either. My colleague Dan Sabbagh has been speaking to the culture department about this and he says that "the resolution against the Sky bid, even if supported by all three parties, does not have legal force." Dan goes on: "Therefore it could be carried, and the deal would not be blocked. MPs would have to pass a law specifically to block the deal if they were determined to prevent Murdoch buying all of Sky." Asked if the government expected News Corporation to take any notice of parliament, a Downing Street spokesman said: "Ultimately, that is a decision for News Corp but we would always expect people to take seriously what parliament has said."
• The BBC's Michael Crick has said on Twitter that Rupert Murdoch will give appear before the culture committee next week. But that has not been confirmed yet by News International. The culture committee seems to be assuming that Murdoch will turn up on the basis that he said that he would "co-operate". Anyone who has spent time dealing with politicians will know that promising to "co-operate" is not the same thing at all. But the committee may be working on the basis that if it says Murdoch is coming, it will get too embarrassing for him to say no.
• Labour's Chris Bryant has said that the police must take action against News International in the light of Peter Clarke's claim today that it lied to the original phone hacking inquiry. (See 3.20pm.) "That is a very serious charge against what is one of the most important organisations in our country and I think it is important we pursue these issues and we find out the full criminality that went on at News International," Bryant said.
• News International has said that it will offer work to the "vast majority" of News of the World staff who have been made redundant. In a statement, it said: "Starting next week, NI human resource managers will meet with each of the affected News of the World staff with a view to placing them in jobs. The company has already identified 30 editorial employment opportunities across its titles, including existing job vacancies. NI has already confirmed that, as a first step, Fabulous magazine – the News of the World's award-winning supplement with 30 journalists – will be preserved." The statement ends saying the company is proud of the fact that it's "one of the biggest employers of highly skilled journalists in the world".
I'm finished for the day now. My colleague Ben Quinn will be taking charge for the rest of the evening.
Good evening. This is Ben Quinn taking over from Andy. You can follow me on twitter at @BenQuinn75
The chairman of the Commons Culture Committee, John Whittingdale, has said that Rupert Murdoch, his son James and Rebekah Brooks have agreed to give evidence to the committee next week.
We are still awaiting confirmation from News International but will bring that to you as soon as we become aware of it.
The Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, has offered his "full support" to John Yates, the assistant commissioner who faced a barrage of questions today from MPs about his decision not to reopen the investigation in 2009 after fresh allegations surfaced about hacking at the News of the World.
Here is the statement from Stephenson:
There has been much speculation surrounding phone hacking, including that I was going to make a statement tomorrow. As I made clear to the Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, it was not my intention to do so, but following today's events, as Commissioner I think that it is only right that I make this statement.
However, it is important that I do not say anything now that could compromise the current investigation or prejudge the Judicial Review or Public Inquiry that will follow.
Today for the first time former DAC Peter Clarke put into the public domain his rationale and the reasons that the terms of the original inquiry were drawn relatively tightly. I hope this helps to inform the public debate and the reasons that the original inquiry operated as it did.
We saw yet again Assistant Commissioner John Yates called to giveevidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee. John has taken on some of the Met's most difficult roles and has an excellent record in some very challenging areas.
He never shies away from those difficult cases and in this particular matter, we need to give him credit for his courage and humility in acknowledging that if he knew then what he knows now, he would have taken different decisions. He currently undertakes one of the most difficult jobs in UK policing, and is doing an outstanding job leading our fight against terrorism. He has my full support and confidence, and that of our partners.
As DAC Sue Akers said today we will continue to pursue our investigations against alleged corrupt journalists and corrupt police officers with determination and support the victims in doing so. No one who saw Sue's evidence today can be any doubt of this.
News International has denied that the Sun had accessed the medical records of Gordon Brown's son Fraser, saying "the story had originated from a member of the public", the Press Association is reporting.
Sky News is reporting that the chairman of the Commons Culture Committee, John Whittingdale, (see 5.33pm) has said it is now "not clear" if the Murdochs will appear before the committee next week.
Here is the full News International statement now in which the company has denied that the Sun accessed the medical records of Gordon Brown's son Fraser:
Following allegations made yesterday by Gordon Brown against The Sun, we have been conducting an inquiry. This is in line with normal practice and procedure.
We are able to assure the Brown family that we did not access the medical records of their son, nor did we commission anyone to do so.
The story The Sun ran about their son originated from a member of the public whose family has also experienced cystic fibrosis. He came to The Sun with this information voluntarily because he wanted to highlight the cause of those afflicted by the disease. The individual has provided a written affidavit this afternoon to a lawyer confirming this.
On receipt of the information, The Sun approached Mr Brown and discussed with his colleagues how best to present it. Those colleagues provided quotes which were used in the published piece which indicated his consent to it.
We believe that the article was written sensitively and appropriately. We are not aware of Mr Brown, nor any of his colleagues to whom we spoke, making any complaint about it at the time.
The publication of the story and the further responsible, sympathetic and informative coverage The Sun continued to give to the disease resulted in renewed interest for those affected by it. Donations to the Cystic Fibrosis Trust nearly doubled over the next year.
We continue to inquire in to other allegations made by Mr Brown, and implore him to provide details to us so we can establish the facts.
The chairman of the Commons Culture Committee, John Whittingdale, has told Sky News that parliament has the power to compel only British citizens to appear before committees - meaning that Rupert Murdoch is out of reach.
Whittingdale said that the committee would only be able to compel Rebekah Brooks, a British citizen and the embattled chief execuitve of News International to appear. Both Rupert Murdoch, an Australian native who took US citizenship, and his son James would not have to appear.
The MP was eager however that senior figures from Murdoch's British media empire are held to account, saying: "I think there is a huge list of questions. They have already said that parliament has been misled."
"We will want to know what was untrue, but there are the other questions about how far this extended up in the company which they run."
The Sunday Times has now responded to reports that Gordon Brown's personal financial and legal files were obtained by a "blagger" acting for the newspaper.
The Guardian reported on Monday that Abbey National bank found evidence suggesting that the "blagger" posed as Brown and gained details from his account, and that London lawyers Allen & Overy were tricked into handing over details from his file by a conman working for the Sunday Times.
The Sunday Times carried a front-page report that Brown, who was then chancellor of the exchequer, had purchased a flat owned by Robert Maxwell at a knock-down price".
A spokesperson for the Sunday Times said this evening:
We pursued this story in the public interest.
We were told that Mr Brown had bought a flat cheaper than any normal valuation and that he obtained it through a company in which Geoffrey Robinson, a close ally, had been a director.
We had reasonable grounds to investigate this matter and followed the PCC Code on using subterfuge.
We believe no law was broken in the process of this investigation, and contrary to Mr Brown's assertion, no criminal was used and the story was published giving all sides a fair hearing.
We also note that Allen & Overy, the law firm, have denied they handed over any details about the purchase of the property and had nothing to do with it.
News that tomorrow's Labour motion against Rupert Murdoch buying the whole of BSkyB will be backed by all the parties in the Commons now appears to be the death-knell for the takeover bid, writes Gary Gibbon, Channel 4's Political Editor, on his blog.
Murdoch doesn't like being thwarted, adds Gibbon, who wonders how he will visit punishment on his tormentors? "Close papers Axe jobs" he asks.
The NHS is prepared to launch an investigation into how the medical records of Gordon Brown's family were leaked to the media, according to Scottish Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon.
The Press Association in Scotland reports:
It emerged yesterday that The Sun newspaper's then editor Rebekah Brooks, now News International chief executive, telephoned Mr Brown in 2006 to tell him she knew his four-month-old son Fraser had cystic fibrosis and that the tabloid would be running a story on it.
Ms Sturgeon said today that the medical director of NHS Lothian, which manages Edinburgh Royal Infirmary where Fraser Brown was born, is ready to investigate if evidence of illegality within the health board is produced.
She said: "Any tampering with a child's medical records, or indeed any breach of patient confidentiality, is a highly serious matter and is to be deplored in the strongest terms.
"Anyone with evidence of such a breach occurring within the Scottish health service should contact the relevant health board as a matter of urgency so that a full investigation can take place. And I urge anyone with evidence to come forward.
"The medical director of NHS Lothian has given a clear assurance that he stands ready to launch such an investigation. Should any illegality have occurred, it would then be dealt with by the full force of the law."
Scottish Labour has already called for an immediate investigation to determine the source of the leak. Shadow Scotland Office minister Tom Greatrex has written to Ms Sturgeon demanding an investigation be conducted.
The MP said: "These latest revelations have filled people in Scotland with revulsion and disgust. I, like other MPs, have been contacted by constituents today who are absolutely appalled at what has emerged in the last 24 hours.
"Each revelation is more incredible than the last, and it is disgraceful that the medical records of a four-month-old child were leaked to The Sun for the sake of an exclusive headline. Those in public life must accept that they have to make sacrifices for the privilege of serving those who elect them but this goes far above and beyond the call of duty.
"Medical records should remain private and confidential. And people in Scotland need to have confidence that those records are adequately and securely protected.
"I have contacted Nicola Sturgeon today, demanding that she immediately order an investigation to determine if these leaks came from the health service in Scotland.
"We must get to the bottom of this matter as soon as possible, and those responsible must be held to account for their actions."
Amid speculation that Rupert Murdoch could be preparing to off-load his British newspaper portfolio, who would be among the interested potential buyers?
Dan Sabbagh, the Guardian's head of media and technology, has just told me however that Richard Desmond (left) - owner of the Daily Express and the Daily Star - has been keeping "a low profile" amid "loose talk" of News International newspaper sales.
Desmond is said to have no plans to revive a £1bn bid for the Sun at the moment.
A former Scotland Yard detective plans to sue the publishers of the News of the World for harassment and hacking his phone while he was investigating a high-profile axe murder, according to Reuters.
Mark Lewis, a lawyer for the policeman, Dave Cook, and for his wife Jacqui Hames, told the news agency that he believed the planned suit against News Group Newspapers would be the first action against the now-defunct weekly for the physical trailing and electronic surveillance of a police officer by journalists working for it.
Here's what was put out on the wires a little earlier:
The case is particularly sensitive for the paper, since the man accused of the axe murder, in 1987, later worked for the News of the World as an investigator.
"The suit will seek damages for both him and Jacqui Hames for hacking into his phone and for harassment," Lewis said in brief remarks by telephone.
Asked for the cash value of the damages sought, Lewis replied: "It's an unlimited claim."
"The court proceedings haven't been issued yet. They are about to be issued. Letters before action have been sent," he said, adding he was also pursuing the suit on behalf of Cook's wife Hames, who had also been followed.
Letters before action is a legal term referring to a letter written by a lawyer stating a grievance on behalf of a client and giving a defendant the chance to make redress before the aggrieved party launches a lawsuit.
There was no immediate reply from News International to e-mailed and telephoned requests for comment.
The alleged harassment occurred when Cook was leading an investigation into the murder of Daniel Morgan, for which Jonathan Rees, Morgan's then business partner, was later charged.
Morgan was found dead with an axe embedded in his head in a pub car park in south
London in 1987. Investigated for 24 years, it became one of Britain's longest murder inquiries.Rees has emerged as a key figure in the News of the World affair because former editor Andy Coulson has been reported to have hired him as an investigator in 2005.
Gordon Brown calls them "known criminals" but, to many journalists, the blaggers who dig up confidential material for cash are indispensable allies in their ceaseless quest for private information.
My colleague Sam Jones has been taking a look at the practitioners of this 'dark art', referring to some who were examined in 'Flat Earth News', the book on the inner workings of the press by Guardian reporter Nick Davies.
In his chapter on blagging – entitled The Dark Arts – Davies reflects on those who gather and sell private and confidential information and writes that many many journalists will protest that there is nothing wrong:
They will say that their job is to obtain information; that the state has no business deciding what should and should not be published; that this is simply the free press at work.
Most of all they will say they are working in the public interest. They may prefer not to acknowledge that buying their way into confidential databases involves no skill and no professional satisfaction and is really no better than a fisherman who can't be bothered with a rod and line and just chucks some explosives into the lake instead.
Certainly, they would deny that they could, in truth, be doing most of this blagging and bribing themselves and that a big attraction of hiring private investigators … is that, for the most part, it is they and not the journalists who will end up in the dock.
The Guardian has issued a formal response following a statement earlier by News International (see 5.52pm).
A Guardian News & Media spokesperson said:
Yesterday's Guardian report on News International targeting Gordon Brown stated that "details from his infant son's medical records were obtained by the Sun, who published a story about the child's serious illness".We did not specify who obtained the private information or how it was passed to The Sun, but their decision to publish the story clearly caused Gordon Brown and his family considerable distress.
Today, Gordon Brown said: "I can't think of any way that the medical condition of a child can be put into the public domain legitimately unless the doctor makes a public statement or the family make a statement."
A news story by my colleague, Sam Jones, will be published online.
Charlotte Harris, a media lawyer with the solicitors Mishcon de Reya, has told the Guardian that News International's explanation to Gordon Brown and his family in respect of the allegations that Rebekah Brooks had obtained the medical records of his son for the purposes of an article in the Sun "seeks to justify a gross breach of privacy by blaming the victim".
She added:
It [News International's account] claims such a breach of privacy was necessary in order to further the cause of cystic fibrosis sufferers.If it is the case that the Sun received this information from another parent it was, at the very least, hughly insensitive and callous to have contacted the Brown family and demanded confimation in the manner that Mr Brown described.
News International's account is starkly different from Mr Brown's account. Mr Brown has said that he understood that the medical records had actually been obtained.
If this had been the case, and assuming that this was not a jounalistic bluff, then this would be a clear breach of the Data Protection Act, and Obtaining a Pecuniary Advantage by Deception ("blagging").
The pecuniary advantage would have been the sales of the Sun for those issues, which do not seem to have been donated to charity.
If the records had been stolen then this would constitute handling stolen goods. If they had been found or passed to the Sun, then it would have been clear that those documents were of the most confidential nature and should have been returned.
Whilst it is impossible to say what actually happened at this point, and whilst it is clear that Mr Brown's recollection is not the same as the Sun's explanation, as with all serious allegations they have to be stood up and fully investigated."
Nick Davies has been analysing the evidence given to the home affairs select committee by John Yates, the Metropolitan police assistant commissioner.
Nick writes that the evidence left a number of unanswered questions about the handling of the phone-hacking investigation by Yates in 2009.
Rupert Murdoch would have known that the hacking farrago would end badly if he had paid attention to the works of Shakespeare, writes the Guardian columnist Hadley Freeman:
Let's start with the obvious – the hacking. Granted, there aren't too many mobile phones in Shakespeare's plays, but there are a lot of the Elizabethan equivalent thereof: letters. One hundred and eleven letters, to be precise, according to Shakespeare's Letters by Alan Stewart.
Many of these letters are intercepted by others, which is Shakespearean for "hacked". While some might protest that this is yet another example of an overused and clunky theatrical device commonly found in Shakespeare's work, I say it is an example of Shakespeare warning Rupert of what was to come.
Pretty much uniformly, the interception/ hacking of letters or, their close relation, overhearing of conversations leads to, at the very least, trouble, and is regarded as a villainous pursuit.
One sees this in Henry VIII when the interception of Cardinal Wolsey's letters leads to his beheading, or in Two Gentlemen of Verona, in which the interception of Valentine's letter to Silvia results in the former's banishment.
Similarly, people pretending to be others, while an occasionally comic device, is generally a sign of tumult and trouble if not downright corruption, which again might have alerted someone at News International to the risks (other than legal) of blagging folks' medical and financial details.
Measure for Measure is full of substitutions (bed tricks, head swaps), all of which are indicative of the rotten heart of the play's setting, Vienna.
In this play, Shakespeare warns against the folly of leaving others seemingly in charge of one's empire when one is secretly still in control (through the characters of the Duke of Vienna and Angelo), particularly if those false substitutes are fond of affecting outrage about the moral failings of others when they themselves are the most corrupt of all.
A meeting between David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg to discuss the hacking affair has ended.
Cameron is to make a statement following tomorrow morning's prime minister's questions, according to Sky News.
Quoting 'Sky sources', the broadcaster reported that the judge-led inquiry into the phone-hacking affair which Cameron has promised is going to have a much wider remit than the News of the World affair.
Sky News chief political correspondent Jon Craig said he had been told it will look at the relationship between politicians and the media as well as the relationship between the police and the media and that politicians from past and present will be called to give evidence.
David Cameron will announce on Wednesday that a judge will oversee the two enquiries he announced last week, writes Nick Watt, the Guardian's chief political correspondent.
The judge, who is also expected to be named on Wednesday, will:
• Lead the main inquiry into the phone hacking allegations which is expected to be modelled on the Hutton inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly in 2003.
It will be established under the 2005 enquiries act which means that witnesses will give evidence under oath and they may be compelled to appear.
This part of the inquiry will not sit in public until the criminal investigation has completed its course. It is understood that the inquiry will go further than examining allegations of phone hacking at the News of the World.
It is expected to examine relationships between police and the press and politicians and the press. This raises the prospect that Tony Blair and Gordon Brown could be called to give evidence about their relationship with media barons.
• Oversee a separate "panel" which will examine media ethics and future regulation of the media. This will start its work soon.
The prime minister, who held talks tonight with Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg, also met Sir Paul Stephenson, the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police.
This was described as a friendly meeting though it is understood the prime minister expressed his deep concerns about the original police investigation into allegations of phone hacking.
Here's a round-up of tomorrow's front pages, courtesy of Amy Fallon:
• The Guardian: "Parliament versus Murdoch"
• The Sun: "Brown wrong - We didn't probe son's medical records"
• The Times: "Crisis talks as Cameron as joins the revolt against the Murdochs"
• The Daily Telegraph: "Hacking scandal executives face threat of police inquiry"
• The Financial Times: "Parties unite in Commons vote to oppose Murdoch's BSkyB bid"
• The Independent: "Party leaders unite against Murdoch"
• The Daily Mail: "£1,000 bill for Green energy"
• The Daily Express: "EU migrants to get British pensions"
• The Daily Star : "Hacking scandal latest - Roo sues over tart leaks"
The actor Hugh Grant has called on David Cameron to "be a statesman" and expand the judge-led inquiry into the hacking scandal to include an examination of the "grotesque" power that newspaper proprietors hold over politicians.
His comments echo those made by the lawyer speaking on behalf of the family of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler, who said that it wouldn't be right for politicians to "let themselves off the hook" when they set the remit of the inquiries, writes my colleague, Polly Curtis:
The actor – who has become a high-profile campaigner in the hacking scandal after his own voicemails were interfered with – said he feared that despite the furore around the allegations of widespread hacking by News International journalists, the government had so far not committed to examining the relationship between the media and politicians in the two inquiries they are poised to launch.Grant told the Guardian: "I'm panicking that despite all the revelations coming out thick and fast, the government, with their history of collusion and obedience to News International, will find a way to make this inquiry insufficient and kick it into the long grass.
"Grotesque abuses have been allowed to continue because of the cowardice of our politicians, who have done pretty much – on both sides of the house – … what they've been told to, partly because they believe News International can get them elected and partly because of a kind of blackmail. There has been a grotesque power over our lawmakers."
He issued a direct challenge to the prime minister: "This is a watershed moment for David Cameron and his government. He can either continue to be Murdoch's little helper or he can be a statesman. If it's the latter, he needs to announce a wider inquiry. It must cover the press, police and politicians.
Here is a summary of developments today:
• Downing Street has announced that the government will support a Labour motion opposing News Corporation's bid for BSkyB. The motion - saying "This House believes that it is in the public interest for Rupert Murdoch and News Corporation to withdraw their bid for BSkyB" - may well go through unopposed on Wednesday. BSkyB shares fell after the news broke.
• David Cameron will announce on Wednesday that a judge will oversee the two enquiries he announced last week. The judge will lead the main inquiry into the hacking allegations, which is expected to be modelled on the Hutton inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly. They will also oversee a separate "panel" which will examine media ethics and future regulation of the media.
• The head of a Commons committee has admitted he is still unsure whether Rupert Murdoch would accept a request to appear before MPs for questioning over the phone hacking scandal.
Despite claiming minutes earlier that Murdoch, his son James and News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks had accepted an invitation from the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, John Whittingdale told the BBC that the matter was "in limbo".
• The police are coming under pressure to take action against News International in the light of former Met deputy assistant commissioner Peter Clarke's claim that it lied to the original phone hacking inquiry. "That is a very serious charge against what is one of the most important organisations in our country and I think it is important we pursue these issues and we find out the full criminality that went on at News International," Labour MP Chris Bryant said.
• News International has said that it will offer work to the "vast majority" of News of the World staff who have been made redundant. In a statement, it said: "Starting next week, NI human resource managers will meet with each of the affected News of the World staff with a view to placing them in jobs.
This blog is being wrapped up now but you can keep track of all of the Guardian's coverage of the phone hacking scandal and its wider fall-out here.
Comments in chronological order (Total 2240 comments)
12 July 2011 8:36AM
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/12/world/europe/12yard.html?_r=1&hp
New York Times article today. Investigators heading original hacking enquiry were hacked by Murdoch press
12 July 2011 8:45AM
Oooh comments allowed today eh? Exciting times
12 July 2011 8:46AM
Ed Miliband should ask this question during PMQs along with many others concerning exactly what the full extent of Cameron's involvement has been with NI executives. What does he know and since when has he known it?
The fact that Cameron left Hunt to face the commons yesterday whilst he prattled on about the 'Big Society' somewhere else shows that he's running scared. Scared of being asked the awkward questions. A pathetically weak performance and poor leadership from Cameron over the last week. Absolutely pathetic.
12 July 2011 8:46AM
We know enough to know that we all have our own part to play in the cleansing of Britain.
We must boycott the Times, Sunday Times, Sun and Sun on Sunday. We must cancel subs to Sky. We must inform businesses that we will no longer patronise them if they continue to advertise in any of the above.
And we must encourage victims of Murdoch's indescribably foul empire to sue for as much as they can get. Before the Americans get in and seize all his assets.
12 July 2011 8:48AM
I'm going to buy a print copy of The Guardian on my way to work from now on. Keep up the good work.
12 July 2011 8:49AM
That's the essence of the 'concerted Yard fightback'? At least it's a step up from 'I ain't sayin' nuffin' 'til I've seen my brief'.
12 July 2011 8:49AM
To think we have had our democracy subverted by NI with the two main parties as willing accomplices is absolutely stomach churning. I think we all just found out how deeply corrupt our country is. Shameful.
12 July 2011 8:50AM
So Andy Haymen found any work since you left the Met? Perhaps a career in some kind of creative writing, anyone find an interest in paying you?
12 July 2011 8:51AM
It may well be the end of News Internationals British publications. I for one shall shed a beer or two if it is.
12 July 2011 8:52AM
Just heard extracts from the recently done Gordon Brown interview with the BBC, my heart really goes out to him and Sarah Brown, the Sun apparently cover the story today but say they're relaxed as the details were provided to them via a legitimate source, eh legitimate??
And @crazyjane @1050 from last night's thread thanks for responding to my query about the response from my MP.
12 July 2011 8:52AM
I am full of admiration for all you Cifers posting rational comments, cos this situation’s got me feeling like a cartoon character with steam coming out of their ears.
By ‘this situation’ I mean GB being directed by a criminal cabal whose latest ruse is flogging off the last remnants of a generic support system for us mere citizens, demonizing vulnerability, profiting from suffering etc.
So, why aren’t the ‘voices of the establishment’ wading in?
What I mean is, why is it that the only comment made by the CofE relates to its investment portfolio?
Why aren’t the big league charities kicking off? All we’ve seen is one or two seek to avoid personal contamination with a criminal brand, but some were willing enough to grasp at a freebie.
Look, I’m no fan of the monarchy and a lot of what I suppose can be summed up as the ‘traditional establishment’. Still, given we’re headed for what amounts to a constitutional crisis I find it pretty alarming that, on behalf of the people, we’ve got one or two brave celebrities alongside a few media pundits and, of course, victims.
Silence, as the cliché goes, really does turn out to be deafening.
12 July 2011 8:52AM
My first instinct is that this story is deliciously funny. It is wonderful to see Murdoch at the centre of the same type of storm his newspapers are so adept at whipping up around innocent people who just happen to come to their attention.
However the allegations which have been made show that News International has no sense of morality, and has wielded almost unlimited power in public life. It is hard to imagine the level of fear that must have existed in someone like Gordon Brown, who felt forced to cooperate with people like Rebekah Brooks despite having their privacy comprehensively destroyed.
Mr Brown's children, the family of Milly Dowler and all the other countless victims deserve justice, and the government had better deliver it.
12 July 2011 8:52AM
We need a full judicial enquiry to find out who knew what and when they knew it. NI journalists, NI staff, MPs of all parties, other media organisations - in short, everyone.
The entire relationship between the media and the government in this country is rotten (and probably has been for decades) and we need to drain the swamp. Sadly, I doubt that it's confined to NI.
12 July 2011 8:53AM
Many would put all of this and what is to come down to good old corruption and greed. They would be completely wrong.
Based on how this country is 'run' and the people who 'run' it the only explanation is simple, straightforward, base, concentrated and highly refined incompetence.
There is nothing nefarious in anything, our Ruling Elite is just unable to find their arse with both hands, a map, gps and assistance by placing both hands on said arse.
12 July 2011 8:54AM
I understand The Sun is claiming it acquired the Brown's son's medical information "legitimately". How can one obtain someone else's child's medical information legitimately? Just as, during that now infamous moment when Brooks confirmed to the select committee they sometimes made payments to the police, Coulson interjects that only in ways that were within the law. Payments to policemen are illegal, there is no such thing as a payment to policemen "within the law".
These people have become so mired in their own cesspit of corruption and self-delusion they imagine they can ignore simple truths in this way. They think they are untouchable because as long as they spin it the right way no-one will challenge the guff they come out with. It's got to stop.
12 July 2011 8:54AM
Oh Lord is this the phone hacking blog today and does that mean that the comments are going to become the kind of Lone Gunmen bunker that the open thread has been of late?
12 July 2011 8:55AM
Albalha
I think they're saying they didn't order any hacking/theft themselves. I'm not a lawyer, but don't newspapers have some responsibility as to the source of their info if there is no public interest?
Of course that ignores what a reprehensible thing it was to do in the first place.
12 July 2011 8:56AM
So why hasn't poshboy Cameron yet named the judge leading the enquiry? Possibly he hasn't found one tame enough to do his bidding yet? Or Rupert wants a say in the decision?
Longer that goes on the more suspicious it is.
12 July 2011 8:56AM
At PMQ's tomorrow - when Ed M asks Cameron yet again why he ignored warnings about employing Coulson at tax payers' expense Miliband's response should be 'The Prime Minister should have read the Guardian'.
How come people like me, a middle aged women living in rural Wales, far away from the London media, any journalist contacts etc knew that Coulson was trouble ?
I emailed my Lib Dem MP and asked him why Lib Dem MPs and Clegg were allowing Coulson into No 10. I warned him it would end in tears.
So if people like me knew, how can a PM claim any sort of credibility for claiming he was just giving Coulson a second chance. A second chance to do just what exactly...that's another question Ed should ask wriggly Dave.
12 July 2011 8:57AM
@ngata 8.46:
If I thought this would work, I would - I won't have Sky and I read the Guardian. But I doubt very much that this sort of behaviour is confined to NI.
12 July 2011 8:57AM
Flashman's sense of timing seems to have deserted him. On the same day as Southern Cross folded, he's standing up advocating more of the same would be a jolly good thing. Oh, dear.
12 July 2011 8:57AM
I'm suspicious of everything Dave does now. He's tainted and really should go.
12 July 2011 8:58AM
I would like to comment on the Monbiot piece regarding journalists swearing a Hippocratic-style oath. What a load of nonsense. The swearing of oaths is a relic of a long-forgotten age. Nobody takes seriously oath swearing, and have not done for the last 400 years. Those that took it most seriously then refused to do it (eg the Quakers).
How is swearing an oath going to stop bad behaviour? Does making a public troth of marriage prevent unfaithfulness? Even with heavy legal sanction about contempt of court - does that prevent people lying in open court?
What are you going to do to a journalist found breaking their oath?
12 July 2011 8:58AM
'We know enough to know that we all have our own part to play in the cleansing of Britain.
We must boycott the Times, Sunday Times, Sun and Sun on Sunday. We must cancel subs to Sky. We must inform businesses that we will no longer patronise them if they continue to advertise in any of the above.'
Happy to lead from the front. Never bought any of his papers and only use the cast offs to wrap cat shit, cancelled my subs to Sky in 2001 and am considering whether to use Tesco again or not bearing in mind Asda is now actually the same or cheaper.
I know they use the Sun to advertise, but boycotting everything leaves you with little choice and they did pull their notw adverts by choice.
12 July 2011 9:00AM
Reminds you of Blair and the Bernie Eccelstone money doesn't it - I can't wait for Cameron to tell us he's a 'pretty straight kinda guy'. However, Blair stayed the course and I fear Cameron will do too.
12 July 2011 9:00AM
What ever happend to the story about News Corp owned NDS hacking other Pay TV companies?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2002/mar/18/security.hacking?INTCMP=SRCH
Not just News International involved in hacking. Can Competition Commission ignore repeated illegal hacking by a company?
12 July 2011 9:00AM
I feel like I did when the Berlin Wall came down and Nelson Mandela was freed. An evil power that seemed so permanent and strong is now starting to crumble before our eyes. There is still further to go and there may be setbacks but at last we can hope the baleful influence of Murdoch will be lifted at last.
12 July 2011 9:01AM
Urban Spaceman I agree the oath thing is vague and stops well short of what needs to happen to cleanse us of this debacle and ensure it never happens again.
So what is your better idea?
12 July 2011 9:02AM
Did anyone hear what was on Radio 4 a few minutes ago...
Missed it clearly as was loading the dishwasher but it sounded like Today was saying that Brown claims the attempts to dig dirt on him were because he refused to jump to Murdoch's tune re the BBC etc.
Could one of the reasons that the Murdoch media [aided and abetted by other people, the Guardian included sometimes] so systematically destroyed Gordon Brown's image was to help try and protect them should Brown try and blow the whistle in the future.
12 July 2011 9:02AM
Boycott The Sun
The Sun is not a decent paper that people should be buying anyway. It is to the great shame of this country that when the people of Liverpool decided to boycott this rag after Hillsborough that the rest of the country did not join the boycott.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blUFXIHuElQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWYICYR_GCU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q26wgbOMBI4&feature=player_detailpage#t=348s
http://dontbuythesun.co.uk/site/
Boycott The Times
Boycott The Sunday Times
12 July 2011 9:02AM
can someone please explain why Gordon Brown waited until he was no longer dependent on Rupert Murdoch support and could stop sucking up to him to complain about this? oh.
didn't think it would be appropriate to order a deep and full scale inquiry into this in 2006/2007 then, no? Better try and deflect it all onto Cameron and the Tories, yay!
what is so ridiculous is that surely any parent who was treated so disgracefully would do anything to project their children and would also do everything in their power to hit back at anyone who hurt them. I cannot understand how Brown cannot have used his position to nail NI at the time and it just suggests that political expediency is his only compass.
12 July 2011 9:02AM
The whole argument surrounding David Cameron’s appointment of Andy Coulson misses the point.
To my mind what actually matters is Mr Coulson’s conduct whilst working for Mr Cameron and in particular whilst he was working for him at No 10. By all accounts it seems to have been unimpeachable, I have neither heard nor read of any complaints raised.
The argument is a purely political one and much of the sound and fury raised for purely Party political ends, and as odious as the phone hacking activates are, they are in any event going to be dealt with by the authorities in the appropriate manner.
The bid is now being referred to the regulatory authorities, and Mr Hunt seems to have behaved impeccably.
The fact that Mr Miliband seems not to have had any confidence in the Shadow Culture minister and chose in Parliament to lead for his side himself, is more of a reflection of his lack of confidence in his shadow minister rather than a reflection of any lack of respect of the house by the PM. After all you could hardly expect the PM to turn up at the House simply because Mr Miliband decided to speak!
Mr Miliband has sought to surf a wave of outrage, and indeed has sought to stoke things up for political ends. This is simply opportunist. We have yet to hear any new ideas and new policies from Mr Miliband, maybe because there are none
Empty vessels do indeed make the most noise!
12 July 2011 9:02AM
This about sums up the ridiculous mess we're in. Why do the press have any say on this at all?
12 July 2011 9:02AM
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12 July 2011 9:03AM
What was Marunchak doing investigating the murder investigation led by Cook?
What was going on and who knew?
12 July 2011 9:04AM
As usual, Jeremy Hunt et al don't live in the real world.
Blagging isn't used only by journalists but by lots of other people too - including everyone in business who wants to know what their competition is offering and no doubt every private detective.
It's also essential for the purposes of journalistic investigations in the public interest.
I can't say I like the dishonesty involved in blagging, but I wonder whether any government could hope to ban it?
12 July 2011 9:05AM
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12 July 2011 9:05AM
amazing level of anti-cameron feeling in the telegraph! If you haven't read oborne's latest, give it a shot, you may be impressed... but who does oborne want to replace cameron? he doesn't say...
12 July 2011 9:05AM
A question for Milliband to ask at PMQs tomorrow...
"Since the start of this scandal, has the PM spoken to his friend Andy Coulson? and has the PM spoken to his close friend Rebekah Brooks?"
12 July 2011 9:06AM
I think you're probably right. This isn't going to Watergate which led to a US President resigning mid-term. But Cameron is damaged goods now. How damaged remains to be seen. Just as Blair's "weapons of mass destruction" ate away at his credibilty in the minds of more and more of the general public, this will do for Flashman in the same way.
[I know Labour won in 2005 but that was in spite of Blair, not because of him. Iraq wiped a huge chunk off Labour's majority. If it hadn't been so huge from the 97 and 01 elections it might have been a tougher battle.]
12 July 2011 9:06AM
He didn't have their support, Blair did. I'd guess it was fear of the consequences. His reputation has pretty comprehensively been destroyed by these rags. Maybe it was revenge, he probably knew this was coming and so waited to kick them while they're down. I would have.
12 July 2011 9:07AM
Every so often someone comes on these threads to declare that the Tory trolls have gone quiet.
Actually I have often criticised Brown on here but I have also criticised Murdoch. Brown was an appalling Chancellor and a worse Prime Minister but his treatment at the hands of Murdoch was inexcusable and I have every sympathy for him and his family.
The party tribalists need to understand that this is an issue that transcends party. All parties have a bad record on Murdoch.
Nothing more would suit Murdoch better that for us to attack Cameron and descend into petty party point scoring. We need to be united across party boundaries and focus on what matters, breaking News International and the style of journalism it represents.
12 July 2011 9:07AM
What has happened to the MIrror''s report that NI hacked phones in the USA of 9/11 families? It seems to have been ignored elsewhere. That would take the scandal outside the UK as the Brown stuff has taken it outside NOTW. Just what is needed.
12 July 2011 9:07AM
Why? Its not new, they hate him the same way Guardian readers used to hate Blair.
12 July 2011 9:07AM
Even after GB knew the Sun tried to get his son's medical records how many times did Rebekah Brooks go to Brown;s Chequers, and went to her wedding and someone says he was FORCED to do these things? Give me a break !!
12 July 2011 9:08AM
Not sure how the Sun can claim they obtained the information about the Browns' sick child legally.
I worked in general practice and the staff were warned when employed that any breach of information was a sackable offence.
Am sure hospital staff would have been under the same rules.
If the info is stored on a computer and blagged then it breaks the Data Protection Act surely.
12 July 2011 9:09AM
@whizgiggle
Gordon Brown whole interview now on News Channel and he's saying it - the cash stuff - was carried out by 'known criminals', he's not holding back and giving big plaudits, deservedly so, for Nick Davies. Mainly of course in connecction with the Sunday Times.
12 July 2011 9:09AM
vercol
You aren't a troll. That post suggests you are a normal person with a different opinion.
12 July 2011 9:09AM
Take one yourself.
kthnxbye
12 July 2011 9:10AM
Typo: last word of: "Phone-hacking scandal: John Yates, who will be grilled by MPs on the home affairs committee todayl."