Leveson Inquiry

Kris Hopkins Excerpts

Monday 3rd December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Kris Hopkins (Keighley) (Con)]

I start by paying tribute to Lord Leveson, his staff and those who facilitated the process. The report is a magnificent piece of work, professionally undertaken. I appreciate the words in the report, in which he clearly rules out any wrongdoing by my party and the Murdoch group. He draws a line and rejects the smears on the former Culture Secretary. I raise that right at the beginning, because much of this debate is about redress. Time and again, there were smears on the party of which I am a member and on the former Culture Secretary without redress, yet some days after publication, I have not heard a hint of an apology from the Opposition.

I put on record my deepest respect for the victims of much of the media wrongdoing. They have been extremely dignified. It took great courage to go into that arena, which for many of them is not a normal place of work, and speak publicly.

I am concerned about the idea of creating laws to regulate the free press in this country. I used to be a tutor in communications. The idea of a free press holding politicians to account is a cornerstone of democracy. The idea of us politicians creating a piece of legislation and then regulating ourselves in some way is extremely dangerous and undermines democracy.

I expect the leaders of all parties to attempt to find a solution. As was pointed out earlier, it is strange that having picked up a 2,000-page document—some 1.4 million words—the Leader of the Opposition wholeheartedly accepted all that in one go, within a couple of hours. That is not a considered approach. The Prime Minister did not reject the report outright. He said that he had concerns about it and that he wanted to consider it and to facilitate a debate. The idea that one party has moved out of the debate is as ridiculous as the Leader of the Opposition accepting 1.4 million words in a report that he had acquired a couple of hours before.

It is important that we create a body that holds the press to account and gives full redress to victims of its often disgraceful behaviour. I want to give an example in which I saw first hand some of the behaviour of the media. Back in 2000 I was chair of social services in Bradford. One day I received a phone call saying that the News of the World had been watching a house and had a story in which it had identified individuals, including a grandmother, who were prostituting the children in the house. This was on a Friday and the newspaper wanted a statement from us.

We gave a statement, and then we wanted to know where the children were. The News of the World refused to give us the address on the basis that the article was an exclusive, and if it gave us the address, the exclusive would be lost and other newspapers would get the story, on which it had spent a considerable amount of money and time. I rang up the deputy editor or the acting editor at the time and said, “These are children we’re talking about, and you’re talking about money and profit. I want the address. You don’t have to give it to me—give it to a police officer or whoever, but we want this.” We had some banter about that and I said, “If you don’t, I will ring every newspaper up and tell them you’ve got an exclusive, and that effectively you are allowing the potential continuation of the rape of children just to maintain that exclusive.” Within a short period of time they rang the police and we got the details, but it was an awful situation.

The right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) mentioned professional behaviour. The example I have given was one of immoral and deeply unprofessional behaviour by the individuals concerned, but we cannot legislate for immoral behaviour. What we can do is address the management and challenge it. It is that failure that I think needs to be challenged. However, I do not think that those children would have been found had it not been for the newspaper’s excellent investigative work. My concern is that we could create something that will somehow stifle really good investigative work of the type that helped those children out of that terrible situation. It is the same investigative attitude that addressed the issue of MPs’ expenses.

A few months ago, a political correspondent for national TV collared me and asked how the Leveson inquiry was going down in my constituency. I said, “To be honest, the vast majority of people out there already thought that newspapers were corrupt.” The fact that the newspapers were hacking, bribing people and following dodgy practices was nothing new to them. We might be obsessed with it, but it is not the subject of pub talk, because people already have a very low opinion of newspapers. Indeed, the only group of people they have a lower opinion of is us, so the idea that we are going to create a regulatory body to look over the people they already have a low opinion of is a little self-indulgent on our part. That will not give the public confidence. This is about addressing the unprofessional behaviour of newspapers and ensuring that an independent body is in place.

[George Eustice]

On the basis of my hon. Friend’s analysis, does he think that the House is wrong to take action to curb corrupt practices in banks, for instance?

[Kris Hopkins]

As was said earlier, much legislation has been put in place to deal with that, yet banks are still engaged in corrupt practices. Legislation is already in place to address all the issues that have been raised, whether intrusion, hacking, bribery or the police being too close to journalists. What we have to do is give prosecutors the confidence to pursue those issues, because we politicians have been somewhat concerned about not upsetting the newspapers and have not been using the legislation already in place to pursue those individuals.

[Mr Raab]

If journalists hack phones, they should go to jail. The problem in this instance is not the law, because a two-year sentence is already available, and it can be much higher if the offence amounts to perverting the course of justice. The problem is with securing witnesses, evidence and convictions. Is my hon. Friend disappointed that the Leveson report says so little about how to address the prosecutorial deficit?

[Kris Hopkins]

To be honest, I am not sure whether that was within the Leveson inquiry’s remit. The party leaders have a responsibility to come together to find some solution that will make this work, and I think that there is a meeting of minds on the vast majority of this, as other Members have said. It will take maturity by the players to find a solution that will make it work.

A few Members have referred to new media. We are addressing this issue, but I think that we are focusing too narrowly on newspapers. As everyone knows, new media, digital media, the internet and other forms of communication will outstrip newspapers. My local newspaper’s website has thousands of hits, possibly more than the number of newspapers it sells, so we are going to see a real change. There are exceptions, but there is very little regulation and few ways of managing or curbing from one country practices that are part of a global phenomenon. We will have to attempt to bring together many nations to address some of those issues. That is where the greater debate is, but we are slightly obsessed with the newspapers.

Finally, on “The Politics Show” yesterday Andrew Neil said that this issue raises the disturbing prospect of former spin doctors, who are known for their ability to sex up the odd document or two, becoming chairs of Ofcom and effectively being appointed by the Government. That is one of my concerns about the regulator and where this will go. The idea that the completely undermined tabloid press will now be orchestrated by Tory or Labour spin doctors who are appointed by Government will not give the public confidence. I want to see massive fines. I want it to be easier for individuals to seek redress and for the people who lie about them and put mistruths out there to be punished. I want an independent body.

Tomorrow is a big day for the newspapers. They should come to the table, because they have been offered the opportunity to make this work. If they fail, I am afraid that they will have damned themselves. Newspapers, both the broadsheets and the tabloids, play a massive part in British society. The tabloids have an important role. They are being given an opportunity to come to the table and they have a responsibility to take it. I do not want statutory legislation to be put in place. I think it would seriously undermine democracy in this country.