Monday 29 August 2011

Murdoch expands internal inquiry of U.K. papers

* Internal probe to cover all of Murdoch's London papers
* Lawyers also examining emails and financial records
* Cash payouts will be closely scrutinized

WASHINGTON, Aug 29 (Reuters) - Lawyers for Rupert Murdoch's News International are conducting a broad inquiry into reporting practices at all of the company's U.K. newspapers, according to sources who have been briefed on the probe.

As part of the inquiry, attorneys for Linklaters, the large London law firm leading the investigation, will be looking for anything that U.S. government investigators might be able to construe as evidence the company violated American law, particularly the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits corrupt payments to foreign officials, a source familiar with the investigation told Reuters.
In addition to conducting personal interviews with selected journalists, lawyers will also be looking at email and financial records, said this source.

A second source close to the company stressed that just because the internal inquiry is examining reporting standards across Murdoch's U.K. papers, this does not mean there is evidence inappropriate activity occurred at News International's currently-operating British properties.
News Corp acknowledges an extensive review is under way, although the details it released have been sparse.

"As is widely known, a review of journalistic standards is underway at News International with Linklaters assisting in the process," a company spokesperson told Reuters.
The spokesperson added the review was "part of a process that started a number of weeks ago." That process is under the "ultimate control" of Joel Klein, a Murdoch executive in New York who formerly worked at the White House and U.S. Justice Department; Viet Dinh, an outside News Corp director who also worked at the Justice Department; and the Management and Standards Committee. The latter is a unit Murdoch created to handle corporate response and cleanup related to the uproar over allegations of phone hacking and questionable payments to police by News International journalists.
Journalists from the company's surviving British tabloid, The Sun, have already been interviewed for the internal investigation. Interviews with journalists from The Sunday Times, one of Murdoch's two London "quality" papers, are scheduled to begin in September.

The inquiry is also expected to review reporting practices at Murdoch's other upscale British title, the Times of London, although people familiar with the investigation say the scope of the review at the daily paper is likely to be less extensive than at its sister papers.
Two people briefed on Linklater's activities said information about the extent of the inquiry had been widely communicated throughout the company over the last month. One of these sources said only a selection of journalists -- including reporters involved in sensitive reporting projects -- were expected to be interviewed about their reporting methods.

Lawyers are also examining emails and financial records that might relate to matters under investigation by police, including phone hacking and questionable payments to police officers or other government officials. One of the sources briefed on the inquiry said close scrutiny would be given to records of cash payouts requested or authorized by journalists at News International properties.

In early July, Murdoch unexpectedly announced he was shutting down the 168-year-old, Sunday-only, News of the World, Britain's biggest-selling newspaper. James Murdoch, Rupert's son and News International chairman, said the paper had lost the trust of readers due to allegations about controversial reporting practices by its staff, some of which he characterized as "inhuman."
Both Murdochs were summoned before a parliamentary committee in late July to face questioning about the scandal. London's police force, Scotland Yard, also established teams of detectives to investigate allegedly abusive or illegal journalistic activities, including phone and computer hacking and questionable payments to police officers.

So far, most if not all of the News International journalists known to have been arrested and questioned by police in connection with alleged reporting irregularities were associated with the News of the World. But one of the most prominent figures to have faced arrest, Andy Coulson, who most recently served as British Prime Minister David Cameron's chief spokesman, edited a gossip column at The Sun before becoming editor of the News of the World in 2003.
Former News International CEO Rebekah Brooks, who was also arrested and questioned by police, edited both the Sun and the News of the World. Brooks was in charge of the Sunday tabloid at the time of the infamous incident in which the voice mail of missing schoolgirl Milly Dowler allegedly was hacked. Brooks was on vacation when the incident occurred.

Although more than a dozen individuals have been arrested and questioned by Scotland Yard in recent months regarding alleged reporting abuses, so far none have faced criminal charges.
Most of the specific phone hacking and questionable payment allegations that have become public relate to the News of the World. However, actor Jude Law has sued both the News of the World and The Sun for alleged phone hacking. The company strongly denied his claim, saying it was a "deeply cynical" ploy to implicate The Sun in the hacking controversy.

Some of the Sunday Times reporting practices have also faced public criticism. Britain's former Labor prime minister, Gordon Brown, accused the paper of using questionable tactics to acquire some of his banking, tax and legal records. The paper has defended its reporting.

Reporting by Mark Hosenball in Washington and Georgina Prodhan in London; editing by Peter Lauria and Andre Grenon

Sunday 28 August 2011

The Evil of Rupert Murdoch

I first and last talked to Rupert Murdoch in late 1983 or early 1984, when he bought my newspaper in Chicago.

I say it was "my" newspaper not because I owned it — far greedier people than even me owned it — but because it was my first extended job, and I had come to love it. I was writing four columns a week, my picture was on the side of newspaper trucks and on newspaper boxes. I was paid well. My wife also worked at the Sun-Times, and we were looking for our first house.
And then we heard that Murdoch might buy our paper. Murdoch was well known in the newspaper industry. He had the same formula for almost all of his newspapers: Stories were to stress sex, violence, crime and racial discord.

Murdoch came to see what would soon be "his" paper — it may have been his first trip to Chicago — and about two dozen employees were summoned to a dinner with him. He was relaxed and easygoing and promised — as he always did when he bought a paper — to retain its quality and integrity.
It was a lie, and we knew it was a lie — but we tried to persuade ourselves of its truth for as long as possible. For me, that wasn't long.

I had a conversation with him about various sections of the paper. "I don't understand anything about American sport," he told me breezily, "but I know the coloreds like it."
I told him that in America we no longer used the word "coloreds," that it was considered insulting.
He looked at me the way Queen Victoria might have looked at a footman who had told her she was using the wrong fork to eat her pheasant.

The evening went downhill from there. I told others about my conversation with Murdoch. Some were outraged, and others said that maybe Australians just talked that way. (Murdoch later cynically became a U.S. citizen so he could own U.S. television stations.)

Last Thursday, I got an e-mail from a well-know American journalist, who was not at the dinner, but still remembers the stories about it. "Murdoch's current spot of bother in London has me thinking of that tumultuous dinner you enjoyed with him," the e-mail read. "My recollection is that you (and two other journalists) launched an alcohol-fueled attack on Murdoch. Ah, those were the good old days."
Maybe I was alcohol-fueled later on in the evening, but I clearly remember telling the top Sun-Times editors at the dinner that if Murdoch didn't destroy the paper immediately, it would be the slow "death of a thousand cuts," and the result would be the same. I was told to calm down. The editors had talked to Murdoch at length, and he had given them his personal assurance that the paper's quality would be maintained.
Within a few months, all those editors were gone. They had quit in disgust or had been shown the door. Murdoch imported his own thugs and stooges from Britain to run the place.
"Quality" was just another word for snobbism, they said. It was not what the masses wanted. And those who disagreed were elite and effete.
"Rupert likes a man who (urinates) standing up," one told me.
I never knew precisely what that meant, but the drift was clear enough. (Though where did that leave women? I always wondered.)
My wife quit the paper immediately, and I hung on until my contract expired. We left the city of our birth and came east. My wife went to The Washington Post, and I went to the Baltimore Sun.
Murdoch later sold the Sun-Times. It was never a big deal to him. It was just a plaything he bought and grew bored with.

And he had other papers. The News of the World, the paper Murdoch was forced to close recently because of a telephone-hacking scandal, claimed to be the largest-selling English language newspaper in the world, with a circulation of 2.7 million in nation of 50 million.
Murdoch was a huge force in British politics, ruling by fear, intimidation and inducement.
Sarah Lyall of The New York Times wrote last week about Clare Short, a Labor member of Parliament, who once mentioned "in passing that she did not care for the photographs of saucy topless women that appear every day on Page 3 of the populist tabloid The Sun," owned by Murdoch.
The Sun attacked swiftly with the headline, " 'Fat, Jealous' Clare Brands Page 3 Porn." The paper also sent a busload of "semi-dressed" models to Short's home to jeer at her and stuck a picture of Short's head on the body of a topless woman in the paper.
While powerful politicians often privately deplored the behavior of the British tabloids, they were "afraid to say so publicly, for fear of losing the papers' support or finding themselves the target of their wrath," the Times article said.

The editor of The Sun at the time of the attack on that "fat, jealous" member of Parliament was Rebekah Wade, now Rebekah Brooks, who has been arrested in the phone-hacking scandal and who testified Tuesday before a parliamentary committee right after Murdoch finished.
Brooks was very, very sorry about the criminal stuff that happened, but she really knew nothing about it. It was the same defense Murdoch had used.
"I was clearly misled," Murdoch said. "They kept me in the dark."
Sure they did. Nobody knew nothin' about nothin'. Nothing about phone-hacking in Britain or of the 9/11 survivors in America, nothing about the bribery of the police or of cozy and lucrative relationships with top government officials.
Their eyes and ears had been closed and now their mouths were, too.
It was a day of see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil ... and evil.

http://www.creators.com/, by Roger Simon

To find out more about Roger Simon, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at http://www.creators.com/.

COPYRIGHT 2011 CREATORS.COM

Hacking names given to Coogan

LONDON: A private detective has passed the names of staff at the News of the World who instructed him to illegally access phone voicemails to the legal team of actor and suspected hacking victim Steve Coogan.
But the names of employees of the Rupert Murdoch-owned tabloid, which was axed last month, would not be made public so lawyers for investigator Glenn Mulcaire have time to apply for a court order blocking their release, the lawyer said.

Mulcaire, who was jailed for six months in 2007 for intercepting messages on royal aides’ phones, was ordered by a London court last week to reveal who instructed him to illegally access the voicemails of several people.
Media law firm Schillings won the disclosure order in February at the request of Alan Partridge actor Steve Coogan, who believes his own phone was hacked, but Mulcaire had sought to appeal.
His solicitor Sarah Webb, from law firm Payne Hicks Beach, confirmed that the names had been passed on in a letter to Coogan’s lawyers but said she could not reveal who the employees were because of “confidentiality issues”.

Schillings, which is representing Coogan, has agreed not to reveal the names yet to allow Payne Hicks Beach to apply for a court order stopping their release. A spokeswoman for News of the World publisher News International said the firm had no comment.

The phone-hacking scandal at the tabloid erupted into a full-blown crisis last month after allegations emerged that the paper hacked the phones of murdered teenager Milly Dowler and the relatives of dead British soldiers. Murdoch took the shock decision on July 7 to axe the paper.

Gulf Today and Agence France-Presse

Miliband demands new crackdown to prevent Murdoch buying BSkyB

Labour sought to put fresh pressure on David Cameron over the phone-hacking scandal last night by demanding new laws to ban Rupert Murdoch from buying BSkyB.
Labour leader Ed Miliband challenged Mr Cameron to prevent Mr Murdoch’s News Corp from reviving its bid to take over the satellite broadcaster before 2015 at the earliest.
Mr Miliband called on Mr Cameron to close a legal ‘loophole’ which potentially allows the company to resurrect its bid before the Leveson inquiry into phone-hacking reports.
When the Commons returns next week from its summer break, Labour MPs will table ‘emergency’ proposals to change the law to give Ministers power to block the takeover, or any other major changes in media ownership.
They have accused Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt of waving through the News Corp bid this year before the phone-hacking scandal forced Mr Murdoch to shelve the plan.
Shadow Culture Secretary Ivan Lewis said Labour would amend the Enterprise Act 2002 to give Ministers powers to ask media regulators to apply new ‘public interest’ rules from the start of a takeover.
Ministers would also have the power to intervene at any stage of a bid if new information came to light. Mr Lewis said: ‘We must act to address  the legal ambiguities which allowed Jeremy Hunt to disregard growing public concern and damaged public trust in the credibility of the decision-making process.’

Last night Mr Hunt insisted the necessary safeguards were already in place. ‘This is complete politicking by Labour,’ he said.
Labour’s move comes after Mr Cameron faced fresh embarrassment over hiring former News of the World editor Andy Coulson as Tory communications director in July 2007.
Reports claimed Mr Coulson, who resigned from the News of the World after its royal editor Clive Goodman was jailed for intercepting voicemail messages, was still being paid by News International for months after he was hired by the Tories.
The company allegedly agreed to honour the remainder of Mr Coul-son’s two-year contract and paid the money in instalments until the end of 2007.
Mr Coulson, who quit his Downing Street job in January, was arrested this summer by police investigating alleged phone-hacking.

Mail Online, by Brendan Carlin, Mail on Sunday Political Reporter

Saturday 27 August 2011

New York Scraps $27 Million Contract With Murdoch Education Affiliate Wireless Generation

The state of New York has scrapped a controversial $27 million contract between Rupert Murdoch's Wireless Generation and the state's Education Department, the New York Daily News reports.

Wireless Generation tracks student test performance and is an independent subsidiary of News Corporation. The New York City Comptroller's office first approved the contract last month amid investigations surrounding Murdoch's involvement in the News of the World hacking scandal.
The amount from the contract was to come from the state's $700 million Race to the Top grant. State Controller Thomas DiNapoli "quietly rejected" the contract, citing News Corporation's "incomplete record" for qualifications, the Daily News reports.
DiNapoli's decision to sever the deal comes after teachers union leaders urged state officials early his month to drop the contract, according to HuffPost reports.
"It is especially troubling that Wireless Generation will be tasked with creating a centralized student database for personal information even as its parent company, News Corporation, stands accused of engaging in illegal news gathering tactics, including the hacking of private voicemail accounts," Michael Mulgrew and Richard Iannuzi, who respectively head New York City's and New York State's teachers' unions, wrote in a letter to state officials Aug. 4.

The Huff Post

Friday 26 August 2011

More than 120 police investigate Murdoch empire's operations

The number of police officers in the UK investigating claims of illegal newsgathering by Rupert Murdoch's media empire has surged past 120.
Strathclyde Police has dedicated more than 50 officers to Operation Rubicon, its investigation into allegations of perjury involving former News of the World editor Andy Coulson and wider claims of phone hacking aimed at public figures in Scotland.

Up to 60 officers are already involved in the Metropolitan Police's Operation Weeting. Scotland Yard also has over a dozen officers working on Operation Elveden, the investigation into allegations of corrupt payments to police officers, and Operation Tuleta, a separate investigation into claims of computer hacking by private detectives hired by News International.
But the decision by senior officers in Scotland to massively boost their investigation into the phone-hacking scandal is a further blow to Mr Murdoch's News International, suggesting that police believe they may have large numbers of potential victims to approach and need to devote considerable resources to the examination of evidence given by NOTW executives during the perjury trial of disgraced politician Tommy Sheridan.
From a small number of officers a few months ago, Operation Rubicon, led by Detective Superintendent John McSporran, now involves more than 50 and has been passed by Scotland the dossier of evidence seized from private detective Glenn Mulcaire.

The surge in manpower potentially reflects the political pressure now being put on the police investigating the NOTW's alleged illegal activities.

Last week, Stephen House, Chief Constable of Strathclyde, confirmed in an email to staff that he had applied to become the Met Commissioner, Britain's most senior police officer.
Six months into the main Met investigation, which began earlier this year, only 170 victims had been contacted by police out of the thousands of names contained in material seized in 2006 from the home in south London of Mr Mulcaire. Rubicon's inquiries are focused on a dossier containing 1,027 names, given to the police by the solicitor Aamer Anwar, who represented Mr Sheridan, the former Scottish Socialist Party leader who was jailed for perjury in a case involving the NOTW's Scottish edition. Mr Anwar said: "This inquiry [Operation Rubicon] has been given massive resources and is looking at allegations of phone hacking, perjury and breaches of data protection. It is an inquiry that will take months if not longer. And the question to be answered is when and who will face prosecution for these crimes committed in Scotland."
Sheridan's accusations also involve another investigator, Steve Whittamore, regularly used by the NOTW.

The Independent, by James Cusick and Cahal Milmo

Phone hacking: James Murdoch is one heir club doesn’t want

James Murdoch's controversial potential membership of Brooks's is to be discussed by the committee of the London gentlemen's club.

James Murdoch’s struggle to cope with the phone-hacking scandal at News International is nothing compared with his difficulties in joining Brooks’s gentlemen’s club.
Mandrake hears that the proposal for the son and heir of Rupert Murdoch to become a member of the establishment in St James’s is to be discussed at the next meeting of the club’s committee.
“There is a growing feeling that he should not be allowed to join,” says one member of the club, whose past members include William IV, George IV and William Wilberforce.
Earlier this month, I reported that Nicholas Ferguson –—the deputy chairman of BSkyB, of which James is the chairman — had proposed him for membership of Brooks’s two years ago. The proposal was backed, with characteristic enthusiasm, by Roland Rudd, the public relations man, who is a close associate of Lord Mandelson, Oleg Deripaska and Nat Rothschild.
Murdoch was understood to have reached the final stages of the application process before the hacking scandal broke.
The Duke of Abercorn remarked of Murdoch’s potential membership of the club, which was traditionally free for hereditary peers: “It’s not April 1, is it?”
Viscount Ashbrook, another member, told me: “I certainly wouldn’t sign in support of James Murdoch as I don’t know him.”
Diplomatically, perhaps, Graham Snell, the club secretary, was unavailable for comment on Thursday.
THE TELEGRAPH, by Tim Walker. Edited by Richard Eden

Thursday 25 August 2011

Chase Carey 2010 Compensation According to Forbes

Compensation for 2010
Salary$8,100,000.00
Bonus$15,000,000.00
Restricted stock awards$0.00
All other compensation$32,482.00
Option awards $$0.00
Non-equity incentive plan compensation$0.00
Change in pension value and nonqualified deferred compensation earnings$2,906,000.00
Total Compensation$26,038,482.00


Chase Carey is Director, Deputy Chairman, President and Chief Operating Officer at News Corporation

James Murdoch 2010 Compensation According to Forbes

Compensation for 2010
Salary$3,192,671.00
Bonus$1,700,000.00
Restricted stock awards$1,583,412.00
All other compensation$181,598.00
Option awards $$0.00
Non-equity incentive plan compensation$2,184,400.00
Change in pension value and nonqualified deferred compensation earnings$1,454,000.00
Total Compensation$10,296,081.00

Wednesday 24 August 2011

Murdoch's banishment is but the first step in cleaning up the media

This is a unique opportunity for reform and we need greater scrutiny, but not by sacrificing a free press

by Henry Porter, The Observer

Moral outrage can become tedious as well as draining, so it is time to move on and decide how to stop a man such as Rupert Murdoch having such power in our society again.

But we should take a moment to acknowledge that we were a lot better off at the end of the week than we were at the beginning. Rebekah Brooks has gone; the BSkyB deal is dead; James Murdoch should certainly lose his job as chairman of the broadcaster; that old player Les Hinton deposited his own head on a platter in the general rush to atonement; and Rupert Murdoch took space in the competition to say he was sorry and mumbled apologies to an ordinary family. This great bad man, as the convict Conrad Black knowingly described him in the FT, has been humiliated and is finished.

It happened so fast that you could hardly keep track of it and there is still juice left in this scandal. Brooks and the Murdochs appear in front the Culture, Media and Sport select committee on Tuesday; and Sir Paul Stephenson answers questions from the Home Affairs committee. Because of the speed of events, we have not properly considered the prime minister's position, but let's be clear that the person who has most to lose in the coming week is David Cameron. I may be going out on limb here, but I think his reputation and authority might be critically damaged.

One of the more shaming aspects of the phone-hacking affair and all the interlocking circles of corruption and compromise is that they expose a huge failure in my generation, which has allowed Murdoch to enmesh our politics, media and police. After opposing his activities for a good part of that period, even I have been astonished at the levels of penetration he achieved – not just a man, Andy Coulson, beside the prime minister at Downing Street and Chequers, before and after resignation, but a former News of the World executive discovered to be advising the head of the Metropolitan Police, just as the phone-hacking scandal began to get serious two years ago.

After the election last year, nothing changed. In fact, the Conservative-led coalition allowed even greater access to these dreadful people and was about to return favours by waving through the BSkyB purchase, a deal that was palpably against the interests of British society. The full accounting on this has not properly begun. What undertakings were given before the poll? We need assurances that phone-hacking and other covert methods were not used during the last few elections.

But let's get back to the future. As a friend of mine insisted, this is a unique opportunity. We have to strike now or see a gradual reversion to the status quo that existed before this scandal.

What we should have done years ago was to limit the ownership of national newspapers and broadcasting companies by any one individual or concern, whatever the profitability of their enterprises. Murdoch owned four newspapers and 39% of BSkyB. That is far too much. Richard Desmond controls four newspapers and Channel 5. That is far too much. Suggestions that an individual should only be allowed one daily and one Sunday title, or a broadcasting company, are a start, but the purpose must be to defend us against accumulation of power by one man. Our legislators and regulators should start work immediately and think about the unaccountable might of internet giants as well.

It is clear that Britain needs fully functioning privacy legislation, not the feeble guarantees in the Human Rights Act that Jack Straw was boasting about last week. Everyone high and low needs protection from the tabloids, the web and the state. This unimaginative, rather shallow government has shown no inclination to grapple with the threat to privacy offered from so many quarters. It throws up its hands and points to the self-invasions and global nature of the web. But a free society cannot exist unless this fundamental right is meaningfully supported by laws, which apply equally to the Earthbound British tabloids as to Google, which, for instance, tailors its operations to comply with laws in China. A strong public interest defence would be part of new legislation.

We need firm and intelligent regulation of the media, but we shouldn't allow politicians to use this to hobble a free press and so become even less accountable. The lesson of the last week is that the public requires greater scrutiny and accountability in all areas of the establishment. Politicians and journalists should not underestimate the public's anger or the way it might develop.

One of the most disturbing parts of this scandal is the light cast on the police. It has been shocking to witness former and current assistant commissioners Andy Hayman and John Yates blatantly squirming in public. Even more so to watch Neil Wallis, formerly of the News of the World, slink from the shadows of Met commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson's office after his arrest. Yates and Sir Paul should go immediately. Then we need a complete examination of the ethics, culture, effectiveness and recruitment policies of the British police. Some of this will be covered by the inquiry into the police investigations into phone-hacking, but a more general assessment of their fitness for the modern age is urgently required.

A lasting legacy of the Murdoch era is one of diminished standards. So much of what he touched was degraded and trashed and at the heart of this gradual process of debasement was our own tolerance. Murdoch played to our worst instincts and he is responsible for a fair amount of the heartlessness, coarseness and spite we see every day in the tabloid press.

For example, stories in the Daily Mail frequently demean its readers. The proprietor of Associated Newspapers, Lord Rothermere, should address the standards of his papers or one day he too may find his advertisers vanishing overnight. The Mail has done sterling work in the area of personal freedom and racism and I am not advocating puritanical or castrated newspapers, simply a renewal of standards about what is unacceptable and cruel.

The public needs to address its attitudes too – the contempt for the private and inner lives of the famous and the disregard for the pain of ordinary people is what led Murdoch's journalists to hack phones and pay the police. Let's start by grasping that respect for privacy, our own and other people's, is a civic responsibility, a moral obligation, which should be applied with the same rigour as the laws concerning property.

Politicians should be thinking these things and leading the debate about where we find ourselves this weekend. Instead, they are shuffling their feet and wondering how to save their skins. With the expulsion of Rupert Murdoch from our national life, we have a glorious opportunity for meaningful reform: let's seize it.

U.S. to investigate 9/11 victim phone hacking report

Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. has promised 9/11 families a preliminary criminal investigation into a report of possible phone hacking involving the Rupert Murdoch media empire.
After a meeting at the Justice Department that lasted more than an hour Wednesday, the family members and their lawyer said they were pleased that Holder made the commitment for a preliminary probe into whether the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks or their families were the targets of phone hacking by journalists at News of the World, Murdoch's now-defunct London tabloid.
The lawyer for the families, Norman Siegel, told reporters that the attorney general had used the words "very disturbing" to describe the possibility that phones of 9/11 victims and their family members might have been hacked.
The suggestion that Sept. 11 victim families in the U.S. were subject to phone hacking rests on a single, thinly sourced news story in the Daily Mirror, a London tabloid rival to Murdoch's Sun.
According to a story based on unnamed sources, a former New York police officer who became a private investigator said he rejected requests by journalists from News of the World to retrieve private phone records of Sept. 11 victims. News Corp., the New York-based parent company of Murdoch's media empire, has called the report "anonymous speculation" with "no substantiation."
Associated Press, August 24, 2011, 4:23 p.m.

MP seeks details from Murdoch firm

THE PENINSULA, LONDON: A leading lawmaker examining the country’s phone hacking scandal called yesterday on Rupert Murdoch’s news empire to confirm whether it is paying the legal fees of the ex-editor of the News of The World.
Andy Coulson quit in 2007 as the editor of the now shuttered tabloid after a reporter and a private investigator were jailed for hacking into the voicemails of royal staff. Soon after, then-opposition leader David Cameron hired him as his communications chief and kept him on when Cameron became prime minister in May 2010.
Coulson quit Downing Street when police reopened the investigation into phone hacking this January. He is among 15 people arrested in the scandal — only one of whom has been cleared so far. Coulson denies any wrongdoing, but allegations against him and about his ties to News Corp. have continued to mount.
News Corp.’s British arm, News International, declined to comment yesterday on a Financial Times report which claimed the company was still meeting Coulson’s legal expenses.
“What it is about this news and information conglomerate that prevents them from giving a yes or no reply to a straight question,” opposition Labour Party lawmaker Tom Watson said.
Watson has been a leading figure in the campaign to expose illicit practices in British journalism, and is a member of Parliament’s Culture, Media and Sport Committee, which is investigating the scandal. “I call on James Murdoch to just say whether or not his company is paying Andy Coulson’s legal fees,” Watson said.   AP

Tuesday 23 August 2011

David Cameron's blind spot over Andy Coulson shows he has no eye for detail

Whatever the outcome of the Coulson saga, Cameron's serial gullibility raises the question, is he fit to lead Britain?

So now we hear that Andy Coulson was paid hundreds of thousands of pounds by News International for several months when he was working for David Cameron's Conservative party. This despite the fact that he let the Commons culture committee believe that he'd had no secondary income.
It seems everyone in the Tory party is now running for cover. Nobody knew of anything untoward. Everyone is categorical in their denial.
But what they surely cannot deny is that they never really did due diligence. This was a man who had resigned from the News of the World under a cloud. One of his employees had gone to prison for hacking phones, along with a commissioned freelancer. Did anybody ask whether Coulson was still being paid by News International when he arrived at Conservative Central Office? If not, that would be culpable negligence on the side of the accounting officers at the Conservative party in my book.
After all, it is claimed that a senior member of staff at the Tory party in effect received a hefty subsidy of tens of thousands of pounds. If so, Coulson could be considered during his time to have been on a News International secondment, which should have been declared to the Electoral Commission as a donation to the Conservative party. And if that's the case, for all its denials, the whole party would be as liable for the compromising position in which Coulson put himself as News International is for the conduct of its staff. Ignorance is simply no defence if you haven't even been curious enough to ask the blindingly obvious questions.
Some have said this also poses questions about Cameron's own judgment. I think that misses the point. The real problem is not Cameron's judgment but his personality. What the Coulson story shows is a Tory leader far too childishly eager to please his soignée News International neighbours to bother with details; a man too naive to suspect that a friend of his could possibly have committed a crime that really mattered. In short, a man too easily fooled, guilty of serial culpable gullibility.
Cameron is fast becoming the blind-eye prime minister. We already know he gets irritated by detail, but when it comes to appointing ministers or dealing with international leaders like Vladimir Putin, whom he is meant to be visiting in a few weeks, the last thing Britain needs is a gullible leader.
There are other specific questions that need to be answered. How much was Coulson paid? Were there any further payments when he went to work at Downing Street? Did he ever provide information the News of the World had garnered illegally to help the Conservative party?
Coulson told the Commons culture committee when asked about his pay-off from the News of the World that it was a private matter that he was happy to explain privately to the chairman, Tory MP John Whittingdale. Did that conversation ever take place? If not, why not? If so, what did Coulson tell Whittingdale and why has it not been made public?
Which brings me to another point. Parliament is going to have to tackle the specific matter of whether action should be taken against those who may have lied to it. Thanks to the way parliamentary privilege works, neither the courts nor the Leveson inquiry can question proceedings in parliament. But if the Commons is to do its job bringing the powers of the land to book, it has to be confident in its own ability to gather evidence and take action where necessary. In the US evidence is taken on oath and lying to a senate or house committee can constitute perjury. Surely it is time parliament brought in similar rules?
Someone suggested the other day that there will have to be a film about the phone-hacking scandal. I fear we are still only in act three of a five-act play. It's far too early yet even to draw up the full dramatis personae. One thing I am sure of, though, is that Cameron's Conservative party deliberately set out to woo Rupert Murdoch and failed to blanch when problems arose. The former was a mistake that others have made, the latter may yet prove to be something far worse.

Hack Job: Analysts Claim Murdoch Faces 'Enemies'


 
The News of the World phone-hacking scandal will not be without long-term consequences for News Corp.'s businesses in both the U.S. and U.K., according to analysts from Needham & Co., who issued a strongly worded warning that the company is under attack by "powerful enemies" in both countries.

In an unusually opinionated note to investors, Laura Martina and Dan Medina downgraded News Corp. stock from "buy" to "hold" because of what they see as growing potential for political machinations against the global media giant.
The motivations are partly personal and partly ideological -- or at least political -- the Needham analysts write, characterizing the backlash following revelations of widespread phone-hacking as a "witch hunt."
"We believe Wall Street underestimates the resolve of powerful personal enemies of the Murdochs and political enemies of NWSA's conservative media outlets," they write.
They predicted that Fox News and The Wall Street Journal (both known for right-leaning editorial views) will become political lightning rods in the 2012 election season, with opponents using the phone-hacking scandal as ammunition.
For all the lurid talk of an anti-Murdoch alignment, however, the Needham note did not mention any likely participants, or even suggest where the political machinations might emanate from.
It is well-known that Murdoch (like many business tycoons) has his share of rivals in the world of business and politics, both in the U.S. and abroad. However, it will be difficult for them to connect the U.K. scandal to News Corp.'s American properties in a way that gains political traction, as these are still mostly separate from the British tabloid division.
So far, casualties on this side of the Atlantic seem to be limited to Les Hinton, publisher of WSJ from 2007-2011, who previously served as the head of News Corp.'s British newspapers. He stepped down from his WSJ post as the phone-hacking scandal gained momentum.
Nor is the trouble all political, Martina and Medina concede, also citing the high costs of settling lawsuits in the U.K., resulting from the phone-hacking scandal.
News Corp. also faces an ongoing probe by the FBI into allegations that similar phone-hacking tactics were employed by NOTW against American citizens who died in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.


by Erik Sass, MediaPost Publications, MediaDailyNews

Call for inquiry into Murdoch payments to Coulson

The Irish Times
ANDREW SPARROW, and POLLY CURTIS in London
THE UK Electoral Commission is being asked to investigate whether Rupert Murdoch’s News International payments to Andy Coulson after he started working for the UK Conservative party may have broken the law.
Tom Watson, a Labour MP and a member of the House of Commons culture committee, said he wanted the Electoral Commission to investigate whether the payments and benefits – which reportedly included private health insurance and a company car – should have been declared because they amounted to a political donation.
MPs on the committee are also angry because the reports appear to contradict evidence given to it by Mr Coulson himself. The former News of the World editor, who worked as the UK Conservative prime minister David Cameron’s communications chief from July 2007 until January this year (Mr Cameron became prime minister in May 2010), is expected to face further questioning from the committee about the payments.
On Monday night, the BBC’s Robert Peston said Mr Coulson had received several hundred thousand pounds from News International after he started working for Conservative party.
Mr Coulson was known to have received a payoff after he resigned from the News of the World in January 2007 following the conviction of journalist Clive Goodman and investigator Glenn Mulcaire for phone hacking.
But Mr Peston said Mr Coulson received his severance pay in instalments, and that he continued receiving money from News International until the end of 2007. Mr Peston also said Mr Coulson continued to receive his News International work benefits, such as healthcare, for three years and that he kept his company car.
The report casts doubt on the reliability of the evidence that Mr Coulson gave to the culture committee in 2009. Mr Coulson, who at the time was working for the Conservative party on a reported salary of £275,000 – roughly half what he was thought to have been earning at the News of the World – said he did not have any “secondary income”.
Mr Watson asked: “So your sole income was News International and then your sole income was the Conservative party?” Mr Coulson replied: “Yes.” Rebekah Brooks, the former News International chief executive, appeared to confirm this when she gave evidence to the committee in July. Asked if the company had “subsidised” Mr Coulson’s salary after he left the News of the World , she said: “That’s not true.”
Yesterday, John Whittingdale, the Conservative MP who chairs the culture committee, said Mr Coulson and News International should have been more open with the committee about the nature of this arrangement. “As I understand it, these were staggered payments from a severance package. So, arguably, that’s just delayed pay,” Mr Whittingdale said.
“But if it is also true that Coulson was provided with a car and health insurance, then I would have expected him to have made that clear. And I would have expected News International to have made that clear when we asked them about it.” The committee is not meeting until September, but Mr Whittingdale said it may decide to seek further clarification on these matters from Mr Coulson and News International.
Mr Watson said yesterday the committee would have to establish whether it had been “misled”. But he said that the Electoral Commission also had to establish whether the payments and benefits constituted donations to the Conservative party that should have been declared.
In July, the Conservatives denied Mr Coulson was paid by News International while he was working for the party or the government. – (Guardian service)

Saturday 20 August 2011

Murdoch BSKYB bid dropped under mounting pressure

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has dropped his bid to take full control of BSKYB after coming under mounting pressure over the hacking of cell phone voicemails. UK tabloid journalism is a cesspool. Page 3 girls and checkbook journalism are an integral part of business, especially at Rupert Murdoch’s papers. So was phone hacking. Nobody cared when it was the royal family and celebrities. Until news emerged that Murdoch tabloid NOTW had hacked the voicemails of a murdered child and Iraq war widows. Previously, NOTW had been able to keep things quiet by subverting police investigations and paying off victims, who are now thought to number at least 4000. But the new revelations caused advertisers to flee. To contain the meltdown, Murdoch killed NOTW. The fallout is spreading, implicating others in Murdoch’s empire and weakening his hold over British politicians. Just as he was poised to complete his dominance of UK media by taking over its largest pay-TV broadcaster. A plan that has now been shelved indefinitely.

www.nma.tv

Murdoch in Free Fall - Credibility Gone Billions to Follow

Rupert and James Murdoch conjured up a fictional report that serves as the fig leaf used to cover the naughty secret of News Corporation --- they never investigated phone hacking in general and they never tried to clean house.

The House of Commons committee investigating Rupert Murdoch's United Kingdom media properties released new evidence this week. The evidence elaborates on themes generated at the committee hearing of July 19 and adds new information to the toxic brew that threatens to drown the largest media company in the world.
At the July 19 hearing of the House of Commons Media, Sport and Culture Committee (Commons committee), Member of Parliament (MP) Tom Watson asked both Rupert and his son James Murdoch if either was aware of the "for Neville" memo concerning the 2008 phone hacking settlement by the News of the World (NoW). The Murdoch paper's on-staff private detective, Glenn Mulcaire, was caught tapping the voicemail of Gordon Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballers Association.
Rupert and James Murdoch both denied any knowledge of the memo prior to the extraordinary 725,000 Sterling out of court settlement of the Taylor suit.
The memo described, "the way senior staff at the NoW had been involved in systematic hacking -- the very thing the paper had been strenuously denying all along, not only to Taylor's lawyers, but to its readers, parliament and public." (Guardian.co.uk, July 22)
Had either Murdoch seen the summary legal memo seeking approval of the Taylor settlement, they would have known that NoW was involved in widespread phone hacking and other illegal surveillance of news figures. That would contradict their ongoing denials that these illegal activities were common practice. More troubling, if true, it would mean that one or both of them lied at the July 19 hearings of Commons committee.
This seemed to be the most explosive issue to be addressed by the evidence released by the Commons committee this week. As it turns out, there is even more devastating evidence of what seems like unmistakable, broad based deception of the House of Commons by the Murdochs starting in 2009.
Bad News for News Corporation from New Documents Released
Tuesday's release of information contains letters from former NoW legal executive Tom Crone and former NoW editor Colin Myler that are unambiguous. Both were sure that James Murdoch had reviewed the "for Neville" memo outlining the rationale for a huge settlement in the Taylor phone hacking case. Crone said, "I have no doubt that I informed Mr. [James] Murdoch of it's existence [the memo], of what it was, and where it came from." (letter to Commons Committee, August 6). James Murdoch continues to claim he never saw the memo.
The evidence released contained a more sinister implication for Rupert and James Murdoch. They invented and described an investigation and report that provided NoW with a clean bill of health in 2007. There's just one problem with that assertion, according to the News International executives and outside counsel who supposedly conducted the investigation and provided a report. No such activities took place. No such report was issued. This is outlined in two documents.
The first document is from former News International legal executive Jon Chapman. (letter to Commons committee, August 11) In 2007, Chapman and the head of IT were tasked with reviewing emails relating to the trial of a NoW employee for phone hacking, Royal Family correspondent Clive Goodman.
Chapman details how this limited review of emails relating to one case has been trumpeted as a thorough general investigation of phone hacking and other intrusive practices. Chapman's letter cites extensive testimony by News Corporation executives at a 2009 Commons committee hearing claiming that the 2007 simple review was a major investigation and that NoW and News International thought there had been no broader illegal activity. Chapman makes clear that this was a limited investigation, a review of emails related to Goodman's case only, and that there was no exculpatory report on NoW's journalistic practices.
During the July 19 Commons committee testimony by Rupert and James Murdoch, there are clear references to a "report" from Chapman and outside counsel on the matter. In response to a question by Conservative MP Paul Farrelly (237) about investigations of phone hacking at NoW, James Murdoch responded: "I think it was Mr Chapman at the time, along with Mr Myler, who testified to this effect -- took a report. From then, the opinion was clear that as to their review, there was no additional illegality in respect of phone hacking in that file. As to their review, that opinion was clear. The company really rested on a number of things from then on." (Commons committee, July 19, p. 30)
James quotes a report that doesn't exist and a conclusion that could never be inferred from the limited review, as Chapman describes it. Of course, there was "no additional illegality" reported. The email review was focused only on one case, that of Clive Goodman. Through a slight of tongue, James implies that the Murdoch group had done their very best to investigate but could find no widespread hacking. This is pure fantasy.
Rupert Murdoch was asked about 2007 comprehensive efforts to assure there was no illegal surveillance. In response to a question from Mr. Farrelly (348) at the July 19 hearing, Murdoch says:
"Mr Chapman, who was in charge of this [the investigation of hacking etc.], has left us. He had that report for a number of years. It wasn't until Mr Lewis looked at it carefully that we immediately said, :We must get legal advice, see how we go to the police with this and how we should present it.:" (July19, p. 36)
Rupert takes a swipe at Chapman for sitting on the report that never existed for a period of time that is entirely irrelevant since there was no report in the first place. Like son, like father. This report is the fig leaf used to cover the naughty secret of News Corporation --- they never investigated phone hacking in general, never tried to clean house. Now, in the context of a real investigation, Rupert and James Murdoch are relying on a fictional report that Rupert claims was hidden for years. The report never existed. At the very least, they are showing extreme contempt for Parliament.
In their testimony on July 19, he Murdochs referenced their outside legal counsel in the context of the review of the email investigation, Harbottle and Lewis LLP. The law firm provided an utterly devastating response to the committee that supported Jon Chapman's version of events -- a simple review of emails on one case, no wider investigation. The firm also added some devastating comments regarding how their involvement was used by News Corporation to imply some legal clearance. The law firm went further, clearly stating that it had never provided a "clean bill of health" to NoW.
"There was absolutely no question of the firm being asked to provide News International with clean bill of health which it could deploy years letter in wholly different contexts for wholly different purposes. If News International had ever approached the firm (as it should have done) to seek consent for the 29 May 2007 letter being deployed before Parliament as evidence of its corporate innocence, the Firm would not have agreed without further discussion. The reason for that is that the exercise which was done in 2007 was simply not one which was designed to bear the weight which News International now seeks to place upon it." (Response of Harbottle and Lewis LLP to the Culture, Media and Sports Committee and Home Committee, pp. 9 , 10)
A Development to Watch in the United States
The Guardian reported that News Corporation had settled three law suits brought by competitors for a total of $655 million dollars. (guardian.co.uk, July 17) This is of interest since one of the cases, that of Floorgraphics, is being reviewed by the Department of Justice as part a broader investigation of the Murdoch companies requested by Senator John D (Jay) Rockefeller two weeks ago. How guilty do you have to be to offer up $655 million to avoid going to court?
A Murdoch Family Dilemma -- The BSkyB Media Property
News Corporation views its US media properties as its prizes. However, there's considerable business at stake in the UK placed at risk by the charges of illegal activities and potential charges of contempt of Parliament. The corporation was candid about the risks their recent SEC filing. Deadline New York reported this from the News Corporation SEC Annual Report: "(We) are not able to predict the ultimate outcome or cost" of law enforcement investigations in the UK and U.S.," it says. The proceedings "could damage our reputation and might impair our ability to conduct our business" in ways that "could affect the Company's results of operations and financial condition."
An imminent risk is the highly profitable BSkyB cable network, the largest broadcaster in the UK. The are over 10 million subscribers and close to 5.9 billion Sterling in revenue ($9.7 billion) for the 12 month period ending June, 2010. Pre-tax profits hit 875 million Sterling ($1.4 billion). News Corporation owns 39% of the network and planned to purchase the remaining 61% of the company, pending regulatory approval. That seemed a lock in January. After the Guardian's July 4 expose of NoW's phone hacking of the by then dead kidnap victim, Milly Dowler, things began to collapse. Just days after the Guardian article by Nick Davies, News Corporation announced it was withdrawing it's bid for the remaining 61% of the company.
James Murdoch is the Chairman of the Board for BSkyB. The board recently endorsed James and his position as chairman.
At stake now is the 39% ownership share currently held by News Corporation. By UK rules, the owner of major media properties needs to be a "fit and proper person."
Damian Collins is a Conservative MP and member of the committee that heard evidence from the Murdochs on July 19. Yesterday, Bloomberg News reported Collins saying that a "contempt of Parliament" finding against Murdoch would threaten his role as Chairman of the highly profitable BSkyB UK entertainment network. Collins said such a finding, "would raise the question about whether someone can pass the fit-and- proper person tests required to hold a broadcasting license if they have been found to be in contempt of Parliament."
If and when James Murdoch is found in contempt of Parliament, there is a stark choice for Rupert Murdoch and his family enterprise -- leave James in place and lose BSkyB, hardly acceptable, or remove James from the position of chairman of the board. The latter choice would be the second demotion for James in just a few weeks. Rupert Murdoch announced that his chief operating officer, Chase Carey, would become chairman of News Corporation should Murdoch become "suddenly incapacitated." James Murdoch had been groomed for that role and was the likely heir up to this point. James may lose his position as head of the most lucrative media network in Europe. as well.
The ultimate nightmare scenario is a public outcry demanding that News Corporation sell off its 39% interest in BSkyB or a move by Parliament or the coalition government to force a sell-off.
This would bring to life the recent SEC filing by News Corporation. If it lost BSkyB entirely, that would take $3.8 billion away from the company top line (the 39% of BSkyB revenues). The investigations and findings could have a devastating impact on the ability to conduct business, particularly if News Corporation loses BSkyB entirely. This would "affect the Company's results of operations and financial condition" by reducing gross revenues from $32.7 billion to $29 billion almost overnight. That's a start.
END
opednews.com, by Michael Collins


Michael Collins is a writer in the DC area who researches and comments on the corruptions of the new millennium. His articles focus on the financial manipulations of The Money Party, the abuse of power by government, and features on elections and election fraud. His articles can be found at here. His website is The Money Party
www.themoneyparty.org

Friday 19 August 2011

World of Murdoch problems broaden

Could the 13th individual arrested over the News of the World hacking scandal finally be the one to bring Rupert Murdoch's empire unstuck?

James Desborough was the News of the World's US editor until the paper closed last month, a position he's held since April 2009. The charges are believed to relate to events prior to Desborough's arrival in the US.
He joined News of the World as a news reporter with a focus on show business in 2005. In 2009 he was named "showbiz reporter of the year" at the British Press Awards with the judges praising his ability to produce "a series of uncompromising scoops which mean no celebrity with secrets can sleep easy".
The FBI has already investigated allegations that victims of the 9/11 attacks had their phone hacked by News of the World journalists, but has so far been unable to find any "hard evidence" of that occurring. However, US authorizes are continuing to investigate alleged misconduct at News Corp's US based operations.

Meanwhile, News Corp has warned in its annual report that it's unable to predict the ultimate cost of the phone-hacking scandal with reference to continued investigations in the US and the UK.
"UK and US regulators and governmental authorities are conducting investigations after allegations of phone hacking and inappropriate payments to police at our former publication, News of the World, and other related matters, including investigations into whether similar conduct may have occurred at the company's subsidiaries outside of the UK," the report stated.
"The company is co-operating fully with these investigations. It is possible that these proceedings could damage our reputation and might impair our ability to conduct our business."
The Power Index, by Angela Priestley

Police payment emails growing worry for Murdoch executives

Reuters - Executives at Rupert Murdoch's UK-based News International are concerned that emails discussing questionable payments made to police by the News of the World may prove more problematic than those that discuss phone hacking, sources familiar with investigations into the shuttered tabloid's reporting practices said.

There are growing concerns inside the company that evidence of questionable payments to police -- or other British public officials -- could fuel investigations by U.S. authorities into possible breaches of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), an American law that prohibits corrupt payments to foreign government officials. News International is owned by New York-based News Corp (NWSA.O).
"We're more frightened by the (U.S. Justice Department) than we are of Scotland Yard," a source close to News Corp who was briefed about the content of the emails told Reuters. "All Scotland Yard can go after is News International but the Justice Department can go after all of News Corporation."

Thousands of News of the World emails were assembled in 2007 when News International executives and lawyers at an outside firm were preparing responses to a litigation threat lodged by Clive Goodman, a former reporter for the News of the World, who was jailed for hacking into voicemail messages of aides to Britain's Royal family.

The emails sat ignored for years in the archives of London law firm Harbottle & Lewis. News International retrieved them earlier this year and showed them to Ken MacDonald, a former Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales and a member of the House of Lords. MacDonald recently told Parliament that after he read the messages in May, it had taken him "about three minutes, maybe five minutes" to determine that they contained evidence of possible criminality.
The company subsequently turned over the e-mails to London's Metropolitan police, who shortly after receiving them set up a team to investigate payments to police officers. The company later authorized Harbottle & Lewis to cooperate with parliamentary and police investigators.
While much has been made of emails related to the phone hacking scandal, which since July has sparked a flurry of resignations within the company and Scotland Yard, some at News International are more worried by emails referring to payments to police.

The source close to News Corp said lawyers hired by News International were soon expected to question journalists at more than one of Murdoch's British publications about possible payments to both UK police officers and other British public officials.
Last month News Corp hired Mark Mendelsohn, who served as the deputy chief of the Fraud Section in the Criminal Division of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). Mendelsohn is internationally acknowledged and respected as the architect and key enforcement official of the DOJ's Foreign Corrupt Practices Act enforcement program.
Reuters is a competitor of Dow Jones Newswires, the financial news agency that News International's New York-based parent company News Corp acquired along with the Wall Street Journal in 2007.

GREEN BOOK
The source close to News Corp said the email traffic indicates Goodman and the then-editor of the News of the World, Andy Coulson, agreed that an unnamed police contact should receive a "four-figure sum" for leaking a confidential file known as the "green book" containing information about the movements, locations and phone numbers of members of the royal family.
The source said the dossier held by Harbottle & Lewis also included financial records showing the precise amount mentioned in the e-mail traffic was paid out in cash. The payment was made on or about the same day of the alleged e-mail exchange, to a recipient who used a pseudonym.
The source, and a second source briefed on the matter, said the evidence available to News International now indicates that neither the paper nor its outside lawyers sought to review the archived evidence relating to police corruption, or to further examine its content, between the time the material was sent to storage in 2008 and its retrieval earlier this year.

A spokeswoman for News International said she could not discuss the emails or how the company handled them due to a continuing investigation by British police.
Harbottle & Lewis says it has been asked by police to not make public the emails' contents "to preserve the integrity of their criminal investigation."
Thursday, parliamentary officials were expected to ask News International to authorize Burton Copeland, a second outside law firm retained by the publisher, to help the company look into questionable practices, the source close to News Corp told Reuters.

"LARGE NUMBER OF EMAILS"
In February, 2007, not long after Goodman pleaded guilty to phone hacking charges, Les Hinton, then News International's executive chairman, wrote to Goodman to fire him, according to documents made public Tuesday by a parliamentary committee.
A month later, Goodman sent a letter to News International's human resources director appealing his sacking. In it, Goodman claimed his activities were carried out with "full knowledge" of other executives at the paper. Goodman noted that even after he was jailed, the News of the World "continued to employ me for a substantial part of my custodial sentence."
As a result of Goodman's claims, the company launched both an internal review of relevant evidence -- by News International's human resources and legal affairs directors -- and a further review by Harbottle & Lewis.

In a submission to parliament, Jon Chapman, News International legal director in 2007, said he and personnel chief Daniel Cloke went through a "large number of emails" to try to determine whether a "limited and specified number of individuals" knew about Goodman's involvement in phone hacking. They found "no such evidence," Chapman said. He said Hinton subsequently asked that outside lawyers review the same emails looking for the same kind of evidence.
In its submission to Parliament, Harbottle & Lewis said News International asked the firm to look through five batches of News of the World emails for evidence that certain individuals knew of Goodman's involvement in phone hacking or that other journalists were involved in phone hacking.
The law firm emphasized it "was not retained to look for evidence of wider criminal activities and did not do so," and said it was only "being asked to assist News International in dealing with Mr. Goodman's internal appeal against his dismissal."

The law firm said the e-mails it collected were shipped to an outside storage company in November 2008 and were not retrieved until March 25 of this year, when the firm reached into its archives at the request of News International lawyers.


Rupert Murdoch sells some of his family silver

Rupert Murdoch, the media magnate, has sold his ranch in Carmel Valley, California because his wife, Wendi, 'didn’t see it in her future portfolio'.

Rupert Murdoch may not yet have disposed of his remaining British newspapers, but the proprietor of the News of the World has quietly sold off another treasured corner of his empire.
Mandrake can disclose that the 80-year-old media magnate and his pugnacious wife, Wendi, 42, have received $17.8 million (£11.4 million) for their sprawling cattle ranch in Carmel Valley, California. “I understand that Wendi didn’t see it in her future portfolio,” claims one New York-based observer of the family.
The sale of the ranch, which Murdoch is understood to have bought with his second wife, Anna, a Scottish-born journalist, in the early Nineties, will sadden their three children. It is where Elisabeth, Lachlan and James spent their summer holidays.
“I come here because my family and I love it,” Murdoch said in 2006. “I feel completely relaxed here. It’s where we gather as a family. I use the ranch as a retreat to entertain my executive and senior team members. People appreciate that you entertain them in your home. You’ve still got to treat people right at the office, but they do appreciate coming here.”
Elisabeth, who sold her television production company, Shine Group, to her father’s company for an eyebrow-raising £415 million earlier this year, will be particularly nostalgic as California is where Murdoch bought her a television station so that she could cut her teeth in the broadcasting business.
In 2009, Rupert and Wendi, who have two children, put Rosehearty, their seaside home in The Great Gatsby-territory of New York, on the market for $12.8 million (£8.2 million).
The couple had been renting the 11-bedroom property, which has its own stretch of beach with a dock, to Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, the Hollywood stars, for more than $100,000 a month.

THE TELEGRAPH, b
y Tim Walker.
Edited by Richard Eden

Thursday 18 August 2011

Exclusive: News Corp execs think James Murdoch may leave

(Reuters) - News Corp's senior management is starting to think about what the company might do if James Murdoch stepped aside, sources inside and close to the global media empire said.

With Rupert Murdoch's younger son under increasing pressure from the phone-hacking scandal enveloping the company, News Corp executives want to be prepared if he wants to "take a breather," one News Corp source said.

"The company is still trying to operate as if James isn't going anywhere," said another high-ranking insider. "But everyone is thinking about what will happen if he has to step aside."

Through a representative, Rupert Murdoch and News Corp senior management said it was "absolutely not true" the company was thinking about the possibility that James may step aside.

If James was pressured into leaving News Corp, two of the sources said the departure would not likely be permanent.

"Even if he did step out of the spotlight for a while, that wouldn't necessarily mean he wouldn't come back when things are quieter," said another source who asked not to be named because of a relationship with the family.

James, who is 38, is known for "doing his own thing", one News Corp executive noted. A tattooed, ear-pierced record label owner before becoming the last of Rupert's children to join the company, he now presents the image of a nattily dressed, conservative corporate executive.

"I'm waiting for the moment when he says, 'What the hell am I doing here, I need a breather,'" the source said.

"And I wouldn't be surprised if the people who are speaking to him and watching him aren't wondering if the time has come for him to drop the (corporate) act."

A third source close to the Murdoch family added, "There needs to be some kind of separation for James from this issue before he can run the company more broadly."

James Murdoch is News Corp's deputy chief operating officer and chief executive of News International, which oversees the company's European and Asian businesses.

Last week, during a conference call to discuss News Corp's earnings, Rupert Murdoch, who is 80, said in response to a question about any near-term succession that Chief Operating Officer Chase Carey "is my partner, and if anything happened to me I'm sure he'll get it immediately, if I went under a bus." He added: "But Chase and I have full confidence in James."

Three sources pointed to that comment as evidence that News Corp was at least considering life without James.

The sources asked not be identified because of the sensitive nature of the matter.

RELOCATING TO NEW YORK

News Corp remains insistent that James Murdoch will retain his current position and is the front runner to succeed his father in the long term.

Plans are still in place for James to relocate to New York early next year.

But the first News Corp insider characterized the move to New York as an attempt by the company to remove him from the line of fire in the UK, not as a logical step in his ascension.

The hacking scandal, which led to the closure of News Corp's News of the World newspaper, was thrust back into headlines on Monday after UK authorities publicized a letter by fired News of the World reporter Clive Goodman accusing senior executives of knowing about phone hacking by the paper.

The letter was written four years ago by Goodman as an appeal to News Corp's then head of human resources, Daniel Cloke, against his dismissal from the tabloid. Goodman had been fired after being accused of phone hacking.

Goodman, a former royal reporter at News of the World, said in the letter that the practice of hacking had been openly discussed until then-editor Andy Coulson banned any reference to it.

Until earlier this year, News of the World's parent company News International, a unit of News Corp, had maintained that Goodman was a "rogue reporter" acting on his own. Goodman spent four months in jail in 2007 for hacking.

James Murdoch, who took charge of News International shortly after Goodman and private detective Glenn Mulcaire went to jail, has repeatedly claimed that he only learned recently that phone hacking by the newspaper had gone beyond those two individuals.

On Thursday, however, James Desborough, a former Hollywood reporter for News of the World, was arrested on suspicion of phone-hacking, the 13th arrest made as part of the investigation in the scandal.

The Parliamentary committee overseeing the phone hacking investigation has said it plans to question additional News Corp executives next month, and there is speculation that James Murdoch will be called back to give additional testimony.

"Legally, it's clear this stuff has got to get sorted with him," said a third source involved with the company.

"His position does appear to be getting weaker," one investor in BSkyB where James is chairman, told Reuters, though he added that he was not aware of any institutional pressure for action to remove Murdoch from his role. News Corp was forced to drop its bid for full control of the satellite broadcaster after the scandal broke.

FAMILY TIES

Murdoch's children have moved in and out of the company at various times. Elisabeth Murdoch, Rupert's daughter, recently reemerged when News Corp bought her company, Shine Group, and her father has expressed his desire to bring eldest son Lachlan back into the company's fold. Lachlan, who once held the deputy COO position now held by James, left News Corp in 2005.

Two of the sources said that when Lachlan was in London a few weeks ago helping his father and brother prepare for their appearance in Parliament, Rupert again asked him if he would accept a position in the company.

Lachlan declined, the sources said.

"He's happy where he is," one of the sources said. Lachlan Murdoch owns an Australian investment firm called Illyria. He is also interim chief executive of Australian television company Ten Network Holdings.

One of the sources even thought the scandal could end up helping James in the long run. This source said that James was a forward-thinking executive with a lot of credibility in the business world, and that the strong performance of News Corp's Indian and German assets, along with BSkyB, Sky Italia and the Times newspaper's digital strategy, is owed to him.

"When he gets through this he will be a better executive and a better candidate for CEO. He will have been battle-tested like his father," the source said.

Ultimately, James' fate rests in the hands of his father.

"There's only one decision maker, of course, and he is often willing to hold his course against public opinion," said one of the sources close to the family, referring to Murdoch senior.

Though the Murdoch patriarch is loath to bow to public opinion, he has already been forced to sacrifice two of his closest executives, Les Hinton and Rebekah Brooks, as a result of the phone hacking scandal.

(Additional reporting by Yinka Adegoke and Jennifer Saba in New York, and Sinead Cruise in London; Editing by Toni Reinhold and Ted Kerr)

Larsen to Be Next Dow Jones CEO?

Dow Jones is without a CEO following the resignation last week of Les Hinton who had been sucked back into the phone hacking issues which happened on his watch in his previous job as head of News International. When News Corp bought Dow Jones in 2007 Chairman Rupert Mudoch flew his loyal lieutenant of 48 years to New York to take charge and to begin a transformation of the company. Together with editor Robert Thompson, Hinton brought the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) more into the mainstream. In Dow Jones he'd inherited a company divided - the Enterprise Media Group (EMG), including news aggregator Factiva and news service Dow Jones Newswires, at times competed with the so-called Consumer Media Group (CMG) which included WSJ, Barron's, Marketwatch and Financial News. In 2010 those two groups were merged under the leadership of the President of CMG Todd Larsen, who was appointed President of Dow Jones. That move put Clare Hart, head of EMG, out of a job.

Larsen, who looks about 16, is now the most likely internal candidate to fill the void left by Hinton. He has worked for Dow Jones since 1999 and is widely credited as being key to the success of WSJ's pay wall strategies. As a potential figure-head of the business he perhaps lacks the confidence and easy-going charm of Hinton and has been ruthless at times when it comes to axing long-term staffers but he has a sharp business brain.

But Murdoch often favours journalists to head up his newspaper companies and Larsen doesn't come from that background. Robert Thompson may be a potential candidate but his connections with News International could create a PR problem if he were appointed, although there has been no suggestion that Thompson is implicated in the phone hacking affair. The only other likely internal candidates have both left the company: Paul Bascobert, the former Chief Marketing Officer left to head up Bloomberg BusinessWeek and CFO Stephen Daintith, who Hinton brought with him from News International, returned to his homeland this year as Finance Director of DGMT, publisher of the Daily Mail.

It's unlikely that this time Murdoch will bring across a News International person to head up Dow Jones (certainly not CEO Rebekah Brooks who has resigned and been arrested) so he'll either have to poach from another News Corp property or look outside. in the meantime, Todd Larsen is apparently acting as CEO, reporting to News Corp COO Chase Carey.

The Wall Street Journal prides itself on balanced and fact-based reporting but the Opinion and Editorial pages (OpEd) have free rein to air controversial views, often quite right wing. In the opinion section of the website today there's a stout defence of Les Hinton's record adding that "We shudder to think what the paper would look like today without the sale to News Corp." The unsigned piece then goes on to rant about News Corp's "competitor critics" saying "The Schadenfreude is so thick you can't cut it with a chainsaw." The article has prompted 139 comments so far, mostly negative. "A masterpiece of bootlicking of your Murdochian overlord," wrote Jean King. "Apparently you do not realise how bad this Rupert-serving, Rupert-exculpatory screed looks. Another exercise in poor judgment."

http://www.mediaconversations.be/

Wednesday 17 August 2011

James Murdoch 'misled MPs' over how much he really knew about News of the World phone hacking

In evidence to a powerful Commons committee last month, James Murdoch said the highly-respected legal firm Harbottle & Lewis had effectively given News International ‘a clean bill of health’ following a review of emails relating to the phone-hacking scandal.
But a devastating collection of hitherto private correspondence between the London solicitors and the publishers of the News of the World blows apart his claims.
The documents leave him, his father Rupert and former News of the World editor Andy Coulson facing hugely embarrassing new allegations of deception and a monumental cover-up

In a direct challenge to the Murdoch version of events, the lawyers said: ‘There was absolutely no question of the firm being asked to provide News International with a clean bill of health which it could deploy years later in wholly different contexts for wholly different purposes.’
It claimed some of the Murdoch evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee was ‘hard to credit,’ ‘self-serving’ and ‘inaccurate and misleading’.

In a detailed, 24-page letter to the Parliamentary committee, Harbottle & Lewis details all its dealings with News International after disgraced News of the World royal reporter Clive Goodman and private investigator Glenn Mulcaire were sent to prison in January 2007.
The saga starts on February 5, 2007 when News International chairman Les Hinton sent Goodman a letter saying he was ‘sorry’, but that events of the past months left the company with no choice but to ‘terminate your employment’.
On March 2, 2007, soon after he was released from serving a four-month jail sentence, Goodman replied to Daniel Cloke, the group human resources director, registering his appeal against the sacking and asking for a series of emails to help in his case.
Goodman wrote that the decision was perverse because he acted with ‘the full knowledge and support’ of named journalists.
Goodman crucially claims other members of staff were carrying out the same illegal procedures, adding: ‘This practice was widely discussed in the daily editorial conference, until explicit reference to it was banned by the Editor.’
Two versions of Goodman’s letter were provided to the Commons committee. In the Harbottle & Lewis version the names of the journalists he identified had been redacted at the request of police.
In the other, supplied by News International, not only the names, but all reference to hacking being discussed in Mr Coulson’s editorial meeting and the editor’s offer to keep Goodman on staff if he agreed not to implicate the newspaper had also been redacted.
News International first contacted Harbottle & Lewis in May 2007, and said the newspaper had trawled through ‘five sub-folders’ of emails and found ‘nothing that amounted to reasonable evidence’ to support Goodman’s claims that his illegal activities were known and supported by other senior staff.
Because of the danger of bad publicity if News International faced allegations of covering up potentially damaging evidence at an employment tribunal, it asked Harbottle & Lewis to carry out an independent review of the emails.
But the review was far from exhaustive. It was carried out predominantly by three junior employees, a trainee solicitor and a paralegal, who apparently had trouble accessing and opening some of the emails.
The bill for two weeks work was £10,294 plus VAT –  a trifling amount for City legal expertise.
And Harbottle & Lewis said its review was ‘directly, specifically and solely related’ to assisting the newspaper in how to handle Goodman’s civil appeal against dismissal. It said it was never asked to investigate whether crimes had been committed at the newspaper.
It was not being asked ‘to provide some sort of “good conduct certificate” which News International could show to Parliament, or the police or anyone else outside the context of Mr Goodman’s employment claim. Nor was it being given a general retainer, as Mr Rupert Murdoch asserted it was, “to find out what the hell was going on”.’

In a withering final paragraph, Harbottle & Lewis says it ‘rejects’ the evidence of James Murdoch that News International ‘rested on’ a letter the law firm sent it on May 29, 2007, for its alleged belief that Goodman was a lone ‘rogue reporter’.
That letter, which has previously been published by the select committee in a non-redacted form, said: ‘I can confirm that we did not find anything in those emails which appeared to us to be reasonable evidence that Clive Goodman’s illegal actions were known about and supported by both or either Andy Coulson, the editor, and Neil Wallis, the deputy editor, and/or that Ian Edmondson, the news editor, and others were carrying out similar illegal procedures.’
In their evidence to the select committee last month the Murdochs presented this document as evidence that the company had been given a clean bill of health. But Harbottle & Lewis’s letter ends: ‘It is noteworthy that it has taken until 2011 for News International to make this assertion.’

The Daily Mail, by Michael Seamark

Wednesday 10 August 2011

Rupert Murdoch endorses Carey as next in line

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Rupert Murdoch acknowledged publicly for the first time that his son James is not the preferred choice to succeed him as News Corp. CEO, at least in the near-term.

In the clearest indication yet that the phone hacking scandal enveloping News Corp's U.K. operations has damaged the succession ambitions of James Murdoch, his father endorsed top lieutenant Chase Carey as a future CEO.

But Murdoch, 80, also said he and Carey had "full confidence" in James Murdoch, who until last month was seen as Rupert Murdoch's clear successor.

"Chase is my partner and if anything happened to me I'm sure he'll get it immediately -- if I went under a bus. But Chase and I have full confidence in James," said Murdoch on a conference call with Wall Street analysts.

The younger Murdoch has been under pressure since the phone hacking scandal that erupted last month at News Corp's UK operations, forcing the closure of its News of the World tabloid and the arrest of 12 ex-staffers. News Corp's UK business ultimately reported to James.

News Corp owns a stable of properties including the Wall Street Journal and Fox News. Media experts and analysts have wondered for several years who would replace Murdoch once he stepped down, with speculation centering on his children as well as executives outside the family.

Murdoch said the media company's board wants him to remain CEO.

"The board and I believe I should continue in my current role as chairman and CEO, but make no mistake, Chase Carey and I run this company as a team, and the strength of that partnership is reflected in our improved results," Murdoch said. "I'm personally determined to put things right when it comes to the News of the World."

Murdoch said that he was disappointed that the company had to drop its bid for full control of UK satellite TV company BSkyB after the phone hacking scandal eroded News Corp's chances of getting approval for the deal.

News Corp's profit rose, at least by one measure. The company, which owns broadcaster Fox and newspapers including the Wall Street Journal reported a profit from continuing operations of $982 million, up from $902 million a year ago.

Its net income fell to $683 million, or 26 cents a share, down from $875 million, or 33 cents a share, a year ago.

Revenue rose 11 percent to $8.96 billion, helped by advertising sales and fees at Fox TV and its cable networks.

Operating income at its cable network unit rose 12 percent, helped by a 23 percent rise in advertising revenue at its domestic channels and a 30 percent rise in affiliate fees at its international cable channels. Advertising at its Fox broadcast business also rose by 7 percent.

Movie profits rose 53 percent thanks to animation hit "Rio" and home entertainment sales of "Black Swan" and "The Chronicles of Narnia."

"They were pretty good numbers," said Collins Stewart analyst Thomas Eagan.

Murdoch said the company would consider expanding its share buyback if the stock continues to be undervalued.

Reporting by Yinka Adegoke for Reuters. Editing by Robert MacMillan and Janet Guttsman