LEVESON INQUIRY:CULTURE, PRACTICE AND ETHICS OF THE PRESS
"I want this inquiry to mean something", not end up as "footnote in some professor of journalism's analysis of 21 century history." LJ Leveson in reply to A Rusbridger's submission to Inquiry. | ||
| Lord Justice Leveson |
Here's a quick reminder of the four modules within this first year of the inquiry.
Module 1: The relationship between the press and the public and looks at phone-hacking and other potentially illegal behaviourModule 2: The relationships between the press and police and the extent to which that has operated in the public interest
Module 3: The relationship between press and politiciansModule 4: Recommendations for a more effective policy and regulation that supports the integrity and freedom of the press while encouraging the highest ethical standards.
Witness list for this week (9th - 12th January) to be found HERE
Video Recordings of each day's proceedings HERE
Live Feed From Leveson Inquiry Site HERE
BBC Democracy Live Feed HERE
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Links gathered throughout the day:
Choice of Witnesses and the Questions Were Inadequate - Roy Greenslade - Guardian
Politicians Must Not Curb the Press, Says Leveson - Telegraph
Leveson: Tinkering Around Will Not be Enough - Independent
Mailonline Fakes Austrian Snowstorm Picture - Angry Mob Blog
Will Lewis Refuses to Answer Questions on Vince Cable Leak - Guardian
Dont Exclude Tabloids and Ordinary Journalists From New Cosy Consensus at Leveson Inquiry - Press Gazette Editor's Blog
Murdoch's Wedding Singer Sues News Corp - Bloomberg
Would You Admit to Reading a Tabloid Newspaper? - Jon Slattery - The MediaBriefing
Opinion: Why Did Leveson go Soft on The Sun? - Inforrm's Blog
'Up to 400 Pippa Middleton Pictures a Day Submitted to Daily Mail' - Guardian
Mail on Sunday Editor Details Private Investigator Use - the Free Speech Blog
Ending Already Given Away to a Flawed Inquiry? -Roy Greenslade - Evening Standard
Video - BBC News - Daily Mail defends Hugh Grant Baby Photos
Politicians Must Not Curb the Press, Says Leveson - Telegraph
Leveson: Tinkering Around Will Not be Enough - Independent
Mailonline Fakes Austrian Snowstorm Picture - Angry Mob Blog
Will Lewis Refuses to Answer Questions on Vince Cable Leak - Guardian
Dont Exclude Tabloids and Ordinary Journalists From New Cosy Consensus at Leveson Inquiry - Press Gazette Editor's Blog
Murdoch's Wedding Singer Sues News Corp - Bloomberg
Would You Admit to Reading a Tabloid Newspaper? - Jon Slattery - The MediaBriefing
Opinion: Why Did Leveson go Soft on The Sun? - Inforrm's Blog
'Up to 400 Pippa Middleton Pictures a Day Submitted to Daily Mail' - Guardian
Mail on Sunday Editor Details Private Investigator Use - the Free Speech Blog
Ending Already Given Away to a Flawed Inquiry? -Roy Greenslade - Evening Standard
Video - BBC News - Daily Mail defends Hugh Grant Baby Photos
Paul Dacre is due to give evidence on February 6th
Mail on Sunday Used Investigator After He Was Charged, Editor Admits - Guardian
Rebekah Brooks, a Social and Emotional Gymnast - Roy Greenslade - Guardian
Crimewatch Detective Who NoW 'Spied on' Arrested - Press Gazette
#leveson starts by telling off media for reporting his comments on shape of regulation yday as "emerging findings"
#leveson leveson also criticised Mackenzie for attacking Anne Diamond. 'his views on credibility of a witness r neither here nor there'
Mail on Sunday Used Investigator After He Was Charged, Editor Admits - Guardian
Rebekah Brooks, a Social and Emotional Gymnast - Roy Greenslade - Guardian
Crimewatch Detective Who NoW 'Spied on' Arrested - Press Gazette
[Judge says he now feels he must be careful making suggestions on ways of dealing with things.] #leveson
On public perception of press regulation: http://t.co/ndFG25nR p39, 2009; http://t.co/ehMPzdRr p41, 2010; http://t.co/I5WYC7pL 2011 #Leveson
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Wednesday 11th January:
Appearing in person:
Liz Hartley (Associated Newspapers)
Peter Wright (Associated Newspapers)
Paul Silva (Associated Newspapers)
Paul Silva (Associated Newspapers)
Witnesses whose evidence statements will be read:
Kevin Beatty (Associated Newspapers)
James Welsh (Associated Newspapers)
Liz Hartley
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| Liz Hartley |
Head of Editorial legal services at Associated Newspapers
The Mail on Sunday and patients' rights campaigners claimed the public has a right to be informed about any threats to their health.
The newspaper believes it is vital that patients who may have been exposed to the risk of HIV should be told so they can be tested.
Solicitor Liz Hartley of Reynolds, Porter, Chamberlain for the Mail on Sunday, said: 'This raises very important issues of Press freedom and the privacy rights afforded to individuals.
'In this case there can be no justification for not naming the health authority which has no right to privacy.'
So no questions at all on the Hugh Grant plummy voice woman story (on which MoS was required to withdraw "mendacious" comment on Grant)
Hartley at #leveson : did search and found no payments to Mulcaire or associates
Hartley now being asked about Raoul Simons. Her evidence has been redacted #leveson
Article on this case from Guardian HERE
Guardian Live Blog:
Associated has conducted enquiries into Raoul Simons, a former sports reporter who was last year arrested under the Met police's Operation Motorman investigation into phone hacking. These enquiries found that Mulcaire was a contact of Simons, but found no payments made from Simons to Mulcaire.
Liz Hartley (editorial legal services for Mail) : I can't recall an occasion when my advice has been over-ruled #leveson
Hartley: was consulted about the people who went to ICO to check Operation Motorman evidence, and was happy with people chosen #leveson
Robert Jay QC asks Hartley about the Information Commissioner's Office's Operation Motorman investigation.
Hartley says the meeting between the ICO and the Mail was in July 2011. Before July last year the ICO was not making available the evidence from its inquiry to journalists, she says.
Four representatives from the newspaper group went to the ICO's headquarters to look at the evidence in August.
Hartley: no desire on my part to avoid producing statements from the journalists themselves (on Op Motorman) #leveson
Robert Jay QC, counsel to the inquiry, asks Hartley about a supplementary statement in her written evidence.Jay say it contains "a lot of hearsay", but we do not know what exactly he is referring to.
RT @JoshHalliday Paul Dacre contributed to the Mail's "mendacious smears" attack on Hugh Grant, Associated lawyer tells #Leveson
Hartley at #leveson : Grant didn't have evidence either on claim info was got from hospital or claim re plummy voice woman story
Hartley tells #Leveson she thinks Mail will stand by 'mendacious smear' allegation against Hugh Grant, although hasn't discussed with Dacre.
From Guardian Live Blog:
Hartley is asked about a statement in which Daily Mail publisher Associated Newspapers attacked Hugh Grant's evidence to the Leveson inquiry. It claimed "Mr Grant's allegations are mendacious smears driven by his hatred of the media".Hartley says it was the response of the Daily Mail to "serious allegations" made by Hugh Grant during his evidence.
"The draft was contributed to a number of people, including the editor-in-chief [Paul Dacre]," he says.
Hartley says Dacre is out of the country, but her view is that the Mail would "stand by" the "mendacious smear" line.
She adds that the Mail had already been in communication with Grant and the Hacked Off campaign prior to his evidence.
"I think if you're going to make a serious allegation and leading a campaign against the media you would and should take care over what you are saying," says Hartley.
Hartley continues: "I think if you are going to make allegations … it should come as no surprise when those are very robustly defended."Lord Justice Leveson stops Jay from asking whether Hartley is "too close" to her client. Leveson says he will make his own mind up, before Jay swiftly moves on.
Jay asks how the papers learned that Tin Lan Hong was booked into the Portland hospital, when she did so under a false name. He says he is attempting to show that Grant's allegations were reasonable given what he knew at the time.
Confused. Ms Hartley says in her view Mail would stand by 'mendacious smear' allegation. But it's been removed http://bit.ly/tWnW1h #Leveson
Guardian Live Blog:
Paul Dacre will give evidence to the Inquiry on February 6th.
From Guardian Live Blog:
Back on the "mendacious smears" point, Lord Justice Leveson highlights the seriousness of the Mail's allegation – he says the word "mendacious" means "deliberately false".Jonathan Caplan QC, counsel for Associated Newspapers, interjects. Leveson says the large question is whether "all of this" permits an allegation of deliberate dishonesty.Nine journalists appear to have submitted evidence on the Hugh Grant case as part of the statement submitted by Liz Hartley.
Jay asks Hartley about the Mail on Sunday's 2007 story that Grant was having conversations with a "plummy-voiced" woman.Hartley says she doesn't know any more detail about the source, other than that it is someone who regularly spoke to the socialite Jemima Khan, as the Mail said in a statement at the time.
Hartley: Grant denied a woman with a plummy voice existed at the time of the claim #leveson
According to Jay, Hartley says in her witness statement that the inference – drawn by Grant – that the story must have been the product of voicemail interception makes no sense.
Grant and his solicitors denied that there was any plummy-voiced woman, Hartley tells Leveson.She says it was denied that Grant knew a plummy-voiced woman of that description."If you look at the detail in the piece it's not the sort of detail you would have got from a voicemail interception. There is detail in there which has come from a source," she says.
Sherborne asks for Daily Mail reporters Sharon Feinstein and Katie Nicholl to give evidence to inquiry #leveson
Paul Dacre will give evidence to the Inquiry on February 6th.
Peter Wright
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| Peter Wright |
Witness Statement in full
From Guardian Live Blog:
Peter Wright, editor of the Mail on Sunday, will give evidence on the third day of a week devoted to newspapers.Wright has been editor of the Daily Mail's sister paper since 1998. A long-serving employee of publisher Associated Newspapers, Wright previously served as Paul Dacre's deputy at the Daily Mail and as editor of that paper's Femail section. Wright is widely tipped to take over Dacre when he relinquishes his editorship of the Daily Mail.Mail on Sunday Page from Guardian
The Mail on Sunday benefited along with rival tabloids from the closure of the market-leading News of the World in July, inheriting its mantle of the biggest-selling Sunday paper. After an initial boost of more than 320,000 copies in July, Wright's paper slipped backed to an average weekly sale of about 2m, less than 100,000 above where it was at in June 2011, and about 200,000 ahead of the Sunday Mirror.
Daily Mail and General Trust page from Wikipedia
Wright at #leveson : editing a newspaper is not like hearing a case in a court of law, only partial info available to you
Wright is explaining the difference between daily and Sunday newspapers.He says Sunday titles have more time to investigate stories and "you are looking for stories that the daily papers won't cover and haven't covered but will set the agenda for the following week."
The job of a Sunday editor is "more what you don't put in, what you don't select," he says.
Editing a paper is not like hearing a case in the court of law, Wright tells Leveson. There is only partial information available and a judgment has to be made on Saturday afternoon."The full array of information on which you are going to make that judgment [whether to publish or not] you don't always have until that point," he says.
"If you are a newspaper or journalist you don't have the benefit of being able to question people under oath," he says, adding that subjects will often dodge questions or avoid giving full and truthful answers.
Wright: I have absolutely no evidence that phone hacking occurred at MoS. #leveson
Wright: in the last year the top payment for major interview or big book serialisation would be about £50,000 #leveson
From Guardian Live Blog:
Wright is asked if cash payments are made to sources at the Mail on Sunday."In certain circumstances," he replies.
He says he believes the biggest cash payment in the past five years was £3,500.
Wright adds the top payment for a "major interview" or book serialisation in the last year was £50,000.
Asked how much the MoS paid the woman for a story relating to Lord Triesman, Wright says it would have been something "in that order", of £50,000.
Jay quotes Wright statement that says he didn't know of use of inquiry agents until Op Motorman in 2003/4 #leveson
Motorman turned up evidence of Whittamore working on a MoS story about Bob Crow, gen sec of RMT union, Wright says. #leveson
Guardian Live Blog:
Wright adds: "Whittamore didn't supply stories. He was used primarily to find names and addresses of people we needed to speak to in the course of researching stories."
Wright at #leveson : Whittamore didn't ring up and offer stories just traced names, addresses, numbers; reporters asked him for those
Wright: if you ring up and ask for info he might offer other similar information #leveson
Exposed After Eight Years: a Private Eye's Dirty Work For Fleet Street - Ian Burrell - Independent
Witness Statement of Alexander Owens, Whistleblower
Mail on Sunday Editor Details Private Investigator Use - the Free Speech Blog
Wright "rebuked" his manging editor John Wellington "for failing to alert me to the practice of employing inquiry agents" #leveson
Wright: seemed we were asking him to do things that could be done by reporters themselves #leveson
Guardian Live Blog:
Guardian Live Blog:
Wright says doesn't think fact that payments to Whittamore being classed as accommodation was deliberate attempt to conceal them #leveson
Jay says Whitt arrested 03 & you were sending out restrictions on usinge 04? Is that right? Wright:Stopped altogether in Sept 04 #leveson
[Wright says his paper continued to use an inquiry agent for 18 months after arrest. Quite a rash thing to do, on the face of it.] #leveson
Jay:You cd have found out if Whitt was breaking law on MoS behalf Wright:proportionality.I was only interested in protecting paper #leveson
Wright: apart from two payments (in 2005) which we... can't explain... we stopped using him (Whittamore) in 2004 #leveson
Jay:What public officials have you paid: Wright: people in armed forces who think sthg in warzone shd be brought to attention #leveson
#leveson mail on sunday editor confirms it used private eye whittamore after he was arrested in relation to illegal trading of info
Continued - afternoon session:
Continued - afternoon session:
Wright says Express titles gave McCann story a "great deal of coverage" + "more than I thought it warranted". #leveson
Wright at #leveson : sent senior journalist to Portugal to do a "cold case review" of McCann story
Wright says three stories in the past year brought noticable increases in circulation and traffic: the royal wedding, the Japanese tsunami, and the M5 crash.His point is that none of these stories were exclusive.
Briefly back to the chronology of Operation Motorman.Charges were brought against Whittamore in February 2004 – the same month Wright warned his staff to take care when employing his services, Robert Jay QC points out.
Wright confirms that the Mail on Sunday did use Whittamore "in a small number of cases" after the investigator had been charged. "The use of him became much less frequent after February 2004," he says.
Wright says it is clear to him that "what the phone hacking episode showed is that the PCC under its existing constitution didn't have means of dealing with systematic problems … it was and is a complaints body."
The PCC did ask News International whether it went beyond Clive Goodman; they assured the PCC it didn't; we [the PCC] didn't have a proper means of testing whether there was any substance to that assurance.He suggests a "standards and compliance" arm that would be able to call editors to give evidence and impose sanctions.
Wright at #leveson : how you get Private Eye into new regulatory body I can't be sure
Wright at #leveson : you've heard from a lot of high profile celebrities and they're not the public. lev: were Jefferies McCann celebs?
Wright: most of them are third-party complaints. #leveson: why shouldn't you listen to third-party complaints?
On public perception of press regulation: http://t.co/ndFG25nR p39, 2009; http://t.co/ehMPzdRr p41, 2010; http://t.co/I5WYC7pL 2011 #Leveson
Guardian Live Blog:
Wright says the PCC receives up to 5,000 complaints a year. Lord Justice Leveson asks how many of these are ruled inadmissable, for example becuase they are from third parties.
Wright says that the majority of complainants are happy with the outcome. He points out that after the PCC received a flood of complaints from third parties over Jan Moir's comments about Stephen Gately in the Daily Mail, the watchdog asked the star's family if they wished to complain.
 |
| Paul Silva |
Video - BBC News - Daily Mail defends Hugh Grant Baby Photos
From Guardian Live Blog:
Silva says there have been "a handful" of complaints by celebrities over the past few years.Silva says Mailonline use a different picture editor.
The Daily Mail receives about 30,000 pictures a day from agencies all over the world, including paparazzi photographers. Silva describes paparazzi photographers as freelancers who are not attached to a particular newspaper.
Lord Justice Leveson questions Silva on what he says are the "rather arbitrary" distinctions between public and private places in the PCC code, relating to where celebrities can be photographed outside their home. Silva says that the pavement is a public place – where celebrities can be legitimately photographed – but not their driveway."We are only talking about a matter of yards," Silva says.
Daily Mail Picture Editor Grilled at Leveson Inquiry - the Free Speech Blog
Mailonline Fakes Austrian Snowstorm Picture - Angry Mob Blog
'Up to 400 Pippa Middleton Pictures a Day Submitted to Daily Mail' - Guardian
 |
| Via Angry Mob Blog |
From Guardian Live Blog:
Robert Jay QC asks Silva about photographs on Mail Online. He says he only deals with pictures for the newspaper.Jay asks about a picture on Mail Online today of picture of Simon Cowell on his yacht, and whether that would be a private place. Jay says the pictures is from Matrixpictures.co.uk. which Silva describes as "one of the paparazzi agencies".
Silva says he hasn't seen the picture as he was off-desk yesterday preparing for the inquiry.
Jay asks Silva about pictures on Mail Online of Sandra Bullock and her son in a park.
"I'd have to see the picture. We wouldn't put it in the paper... But I don't know the circumstances so I can't really comment," says Silva.
"What's disturbing about these photographs is that the faces of the children haven't been pixiellated ... would you like to see the pictures?" says Jay.
Silva says he doesn't know the circumstances around the pictures. "All the questions I've listed would all be asked in relation to those pictures," Silva says.
On a picture of Bullock trying to shield her child from photographers, he says: "If that was a British celebrity taken in a British park we'd be asking a lot of questions, yes."
Silva: There is policy about photographing Pippa Middleton since the royal wedding. I get 300-400 pics of her a day, we don't use. #Leveson
Silva says PCC shd give paps training on how to behave, Silva tells #leveson
From Guardian Live Blog:
Silva is being asked why the paper's normal policy on pictures of children did not apply to the McCanns."It was the most intense story I've ever worked on," he says. "One of the most difficult I've ever had to work with."
Asked if he has any recommendations, he says the PCC and NPA should get involved were there another situation like the McCanns.
"If you take the McCann situation, if we are unfortuately in that situation again, an organisation like the PCC should be stepping in."
He suggests a PCC training scheme for freelance photographers "where they're aware of their responsibilities".
Wright: Story about Mandelson buying £8m house came from member of the public #leveson
Guardian Live Blog:
Robert Jay QC moves on to a story about Lord Mandelson buying an £8m house. Mandelson argued that as he was no longer in politics there was no public interest in the story being published."I think there's a public interest in knowing how somebody who until a year previously had been a government minister on a generous, but not over-generous, salary was able to afford such a house," Wright says.
Witnesses whose evidence will be read:
Kevin Beatty
James Welsh
