Phone Hacking

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Attorney-General]

He was minded to. As a result of having done so, a series of assurances were provided, which satisfied him. Thereafter, I suggest that the hon. Gentleman refers that question to my right hon. Friend.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

Could the Attorney-General just tell the House from whom those assurances were received?

[The Attorney-General]

Those assurances were received from News International and were independently validated and referred to Ofcom. May I say to the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan) that we have to have a little care here? The process by which such a takeover is done follows what is a quasi-judicial procedure, as he is aware. Therefore, in those circumstances, my right hon. Friend’s options in terms of what he had to do were quite severely circumscribed. If the hon. Gentleman feels that that was not properly conducted, I suggest that he raise that with my right hon. Friend directly.

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[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

The whole country is rightly shocked at the revelations of what has been going on in our media, but today is not the time to go into details about who said what or did what at what time. Our role is to secure a full and open public inquiry. I note the acceptance of that by the Government Front-Bench team, but the issue now is when. We need to secure the available evidence to do a thorough job of investigating the issue now. The inquiry needs to be set up while the police investigations continue.

This debate is about what kind of country we want to be. A free press is an essential part of our democracy. It challenges us, exposes our weaknesses, sometimes helps to get our message across and keeps people informed of the arguments to help them to form a balanced opinion. However, the press has developed as Parliament has developed and there is a symbiotic relationship between politics and journalism. The issues we are debating here today really go to the heart of what kind of nation we want to be in the future.

We need to understand that what we are debating today has to do with how we treat weak and vulnerable people or the bereaved, and whether we stand up for people when they are under pressure or being unfairly treated, or whether we become part of a baying mob, egged on by the likes of the News of the World, eager for a kill just for the sheer excitement of it and heedless of the consequences for the victims and of whether what we are witnessing amounts to justice.

I do not believe that people want to live in that sort of country or feel that we have become such a country. The public do not share the values of the media people who have effectively brought this debate to the Floor of the House today. They do not share the values of those who have invaded the lives of innocent victims and bereaved families when they are grieving and at their most vulnerable.

I was not brought up in a country that stood by while others suffered. I always believed that the post-war Britain I grew up in was a country that stood up for fairness and perhaps for those who were not as strong as ourselves. I thought the country was populated by a heroic generation that was justifiably proud of what it had endured through the second world war and of the freedoms that had been won—not just for themselves but for the whole world. That was achieved by ordinary people doing extraordinary things for the greater good of everyone. It is these ordinary people we are defending today.

Who are the people who believe that they can trample over the lives of ordinary people and use them for their own ends or their own advancement? Should we allow ourselves to be seduced into accepting that the things these people dictate to us, claiming they are in our interest, are acceptable and should be allowed to happen?

[Helen Goodman]

rose—

[Clive Efford]

I will not give way, if my hon. Friend does not mind.

I cannot go into the detail of specific cases, as others have done. What I will say, however—this is one of the points that I really wanted to make—is that I think there is a corporate responsibility. I applaud Ford for withdrawing its advertising from News Corporation. I also think that anyone who is not a fit and proper person to drive my old taxi should not be put in charge of a major news outlet.

Other organisations—Halifax, npower, T-Mobile and Orange—say that they are reconsidering their position, while Tesco and Virgin Media say that they will wait for the outcome of the police inquiry. That is not good enough. I say to people who may be purchasing goods from those organisations, or thinking of buying a new mobile phone, that they should not trade with companies that do not stand side by side with the ordinary person in the street who is outraged at what has gone on in News International.

Only if ordinary people make a stand will we stop these rich people—rich people who have invaded the lives of ordinary people in the street—making themselves even richer and even more powerful. Only by hurting them where it really matters—in their profits—will the ordinary person in the street influence their behaviour in the future.

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[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

May I add that Mr Speaker has done a great service to Parliament and the many victims and their families by allowing today’s debate?

Three years have now passed since we who serve on the Culture, Media and Sport Committee started our inquiry into press standards, privacy and libel. We undertook that inquiry because of the treatment the tabloid press meted out to the McCann family, and it took such a long time because we had to reopen the investigation into phone hacking, not for political reasons but for the integrity of this House as it was clear that we had been misled by News International. Last year, we did not believe its follow-up evidence either, and subsequent events have proved us right. As many people have said, the latest events are likely to prove to be the tip of the iceberg of cynicism, double standards, cover-up and law breaking over a long period by a publication that clearly felt itself to be above the law.

[Helen Goodman]

My right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson) made the point that the former Director of Public Prosecutions has now been taken on as a silk for News International, and that is indeed the case. He was DPP when Glenn Mulcaire was prosecuted. The Attorney-General said that that was a matter for his professional ethics, but surely this should have gone through the Cabinet Office as he was a senior public servant?

[Paul Farrelly]

I entirely agree. The former DPP should be invited to examine not only his ethics and his conscience, but his record in this, because he is also culpable in the failure to get to the bottom of this affair.

Nothing should surprise us about the News of the World, but what did surprise us during our inquiry was the approach of the Metropolitan police and the evidence it gave to us. Our report was highly critical of the Met, but right up until the start of Operation Weeting in January there seemed to be a determination to limit the inquiry and close it down as quickly as possible. The concerns about that, and about the Metropolitan police’s links to a powerful Sunday tabloid, have long merited this independent inquiry that is going to be allowed today.

We must not lose sight of the fact that, despicable and unlawful as it is, phone hacking is just one clever ruse, and there is a further question any inquiry must address: was there a trade in information in return for payments or favours between the police and the News of the World that was not only unlawful or unethical, but was to the detriment of ordinary people—not just celebrities such as Sienna Miller, or politicians, but ordinary people who might be considered fair game by the News of the World, but whose well-being it is the police’s duty to protect? These questions alone constitute good grounds for an independent public inquiry.

Before the Prime Minister’s statement today, I was pondering whether we could rely on the News of the World, with its new spirit of thorough co-operation, to whistleblow on itself fully. I suggest the record rather suggests not. Indeed, following the publication of our report of February last year, News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks dismissed it, and News International issued a statement saying, with absolutely no hint of irony, that

“the reaction of the Committee to its failure to find any new evidence has been to make claims of ‘collective amnesia’, deliberate obfuscation and concealment of the truth.”

For good measure, it added, again with no irony, that

“certain members of this CMS Committee have repeatedly violated the public trust.”

Editor Colin Myler was more explicit. He singled out me and my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson) in a full-page editorial:

“We’ll take no lessons in standards”.

He continued:

“Sadly, the victims here are you, the public”.

That was very prescient of Mr Myler, but clearly not in the way he intended. That scathing, self-serving editorial ran to more than 1,100 words, whereas the eventual apology to victims in April this year ran to just 160 words. That would be comical if it were not so sad.

Much has been said about Rebekah Brooks, and I agree that her position is untenable. As for the editor of the News of the World—I will be charitable—Mr Myler has, by now, had so much wool pulled over his eyes that he clearly cannot find his own self-respect or his resignation; he is staying in post at the News of the World.

Could the Press Complaints Commission be trusted with an inquiry? Sadly, the answer is no. The PCC was lauded in that editorial, but this is how its chair, Baroness Buscombe, returned the compliment yesterday:

“There’s only so much we can do when people are lying to us.”

The PCC accepted none of our recommendations, including our suggestion for a new name—the press complaints and standards commission. The body commands little respect and it has a much-diminished chair. As for the police, Operation Weeting certainly seems to be more thorough, but beforehand there was little competition. It is time for a public inquiry, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) has suggested.

Following the latest revelations there has been much talk of a “tipping point” for the press, but we have been at tipping points many times before—for example, with the McCann family—and nothing has changed. Above all, for the better of decent journalism in this country, all newspaper proprietors, not just Rupert Murdoch, must look themselves in the mirror and ask, “Do I like what I see?” and, “Do I care to change it?”

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[Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)]

First, let me apologise to hon. Members who might wonder why I have been called, given that I left the Chamber earlier. I went to see the Third Reading of my private Member’s Bill in the other place; unfortunately, there seemed to be a mini-debate on Lords reform first.

I absolutely share hon. Members’ feelings of being appalled at the revelations and allegations being made today. Of course I extend my sympathy to the victims, including Beverli Rhodes, a 7/7 survivor whom people might have heard on LBC this morning saying that she was concerned that her phone had been hacked.

There are several issues to discuss, but I am afraid I might break the somewhat cosy consensus that has developed so far. There is no question but that the police investigation has been shown to be unsatisfactory, as we have seen from previous reports of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee. However, there are some things we can do straight away. The whole business of dancing on the head of a pin regarding whether certain hacking is illegal could be dealt with by a simple change to clause 1 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000. I have confidence that Deputy Assistant Commissioner Akers will make some progress with Operation Weeting, but I also understand that it might be appropriate to bring in an external force to help with that.

The hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson) has brought in some new allegations about News International today. I agree that News International has not helped itself with its drip-drip feed of information and, perhaps, casual approach to investigation internally. I do not know whether the actions were deliberate or whether there were simply people there who were out of control. What I do know is that News Corp did finally react, and has brought in people to do an investigation, which is the right thing to do alongside the police inquiry.

I believe that a witch hunt against Rebekah Brooks is being developed. I do not hold a candle for her—I met her once last year at a Conservative party conference and I am sure that she has been at Labour party conferences before—but I am worried about this aspect. This is not the time to hold back evidence, and I hope that my hon. Friends will present evidence rather than simply say that Rebekah Brooks was the editor at the time. Let me give the analogy of a sales director I know of from my previous commercial experience who was pressurising his sales people to keep up with their quotas and find new business. He was not aware that two people were indulging in what could be called illegal practices—basically, bribing people—and it is right that we found that out, but I am not saying it was right for that sales director to be told they personally had to resign.

[Helen Goodman]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Dr Coffey]

I cannot give way, because I know that other people want to speak.

I also recognise that Operation Motorman and Operation Glade took place. Indeed, Rebekah Brooks herself was told that her phone might have been hacked and that the Home Office and the police also tapped her phone—[Hon. Members: “Ah!”] I am just saying that it happens to a number of people. What that reflects, as the Information Commissioner discussed in his report back in 2006, is that the problem was not unique to one news group. The multiple inquiries that we have, which I fully support, should look across the news industry, not solely at News International.

There is also a route within Parliament to address this. We have heard today about how Parliament did not react, but the Culture, Media and Sport Committee did. We also have an opportunity to address this issue through the privacy committee being set up to look at super-injunctions. We could extend its terms to address this, in addition to the public inquiry. Given the lack of confidence in previous Members of the House, perhaps it should have a majority of new Members.

Moving forward, I should like the police inquiry to be given as much resource as it needs to reach its conclusions very quickly. I want the public inquiries to be established and I should like the privacy committee to be enhanced. Finally, let me make one point about BSkyB. News International is not News Corp, Rebekah Brooks is not a director of News Corp or BSkyB, and I understand that she has no intention of ever being so.