Public Confidence in the Media and Police

Jack Straw Excerpts

Wednesday 20th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First, I accept the point that the right hon. Gentleman makes about transparency, and what I have set out is not just meetings that were, if you like, business meetings—official meetings with media executives and proprietors—but private meetings as well.

In relation to the meeting I held with Rupert Murdoch, the question is not whether he came in through the back door or front door but whether it was declared in the proper way, and yes, it was. In the old days, the only way we found out whether someone had met Rupert Murdoch was by waiting for Alastair Campbell’s diaries. In our case we have been very transparent about it. The information goes all the way back to the election and includes both private and official meetings, whether they were at Chequers or No. 10 Downing street. I think we need to go further in that regard, and I think that should be the new standard. I say to the Leader of the Opposition, who has published the information back to when he became leader of the Labour party: why cannot we see it right back to the general election?

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

When the Prime Minister read of the extensive investigation in The New York Times on 1 September last year, what was his reaction, and what did he do?

[The Prime Minister]

The question I ask myself all the way through is, “Is there new information that Andy Coulson knew about hacking at the News of the World?” I could not be clearer about this: if it turns out that he knew about that hacking, he will have lied to a Select Committee, he will have lied to the police, he will have lied to a court of law and he will have lied to me. I made the decision to employ him in good faith, because of the assurances he gave me. There was no information in that article that would lead me to change my mind about those assurances, but if it turns out—[Interruption.] As I said, I could not be clearer. If it turns out that he knew about the hacking, that will be a matter of huge regret and a matter for great apology, and it will be not only a disgrace that he worked in government but, vitally, something that would be subject to criminal prosecutions.