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LEVESON Inquiry

Posts Tagged ‘LEVESON Inquiry’

‘Going to Santorini’: Carine Patry Hoskins and David Sherborne in Leveson earn ‘n’ tell

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CARINE Patry Hoskins earned £218,606 for her work on the Leveson Inquiry into media standards. He worked on the Inquiry between July 2011 and November 2012.

Hoskins, a married mother of two interviewed witnesses. She reviewed their statements and conducted legal research. She was fact checking.

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Posted: 15th, June 2013 | In: Reviews | Comment


The Leveson Inquiry almost completely ignored the Internet – just like the old media

THE Leveson Inquiry report has been criticised for not addressing the impact of the internet on the press, and the way it was published today was symptomatic of old-fashioned print publishing that doesn’t put user need at the centre, writes Martin Belam.

There were a lot of jokes on Twitter today that you could pay £250 to get the Leveson Inquiry report in print, or download it for free on the internet, which served as some kind of analogy for the state our newspapers find themselves in.

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Posted: 30th, November 2012 | In: Technology | Comment


The Leveson Inquiry in cakes

TO mark the Leveson Inquiry into media standards and all that phone hacking, Miss Insomnia Tulip has created a cake for all the star players, including Rebekah Brooks and her whipped hair,  Jeremy Hunt as an escapee and Rupert Murdoch, who reminds us of Lionel Jeffries in Two Way Stretch.

PS – what odd Piers Morgan buys his and licks off the icing? (Top left is God – the Standard Poodle years. Click to embiggen.)

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Posted: 27th, May 2012 | In: Reviews | Comment


A “two-fingered salute” to the Leveson Inquiry

AS THE Leveson Inquiry into the culture, practices and ethics of the press trundles on, online magazine spiked launches an “intellectual two-fingered salute to the creeping conformism and censoriousness being unleashed by the Leveson process”.

Explaining the decision to launch a “Counter-Leveson Inquiry”, spiked editor Brendan O’Neill said the magazine intends to “carry a torch for press freedom”. The campaign will “put the case against Leveson, against judges and police getting to tell the press what its ethics should be, and against any stricture whatsoever on the right of the press, whether highbrow or low-rent, to investigate and publish what it sees fit”.

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Posted: 29th, February 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comments (11)


Leveson Inquiry: News of the World journalists hacked each others phones

LEVESON Inquiry: today the Times and the Guardian’s Alan Rusbridger take the stand. It should be interesting. In 2009, News International’s interim director of legal affairs, Simon Toms, revelsed that the Times knew about phone hacking on its paper in 2009 (via the Press Gazette):

Question: Explain whether you, or The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun or The News of the World (to the best of your knowledge) ever used or commissioned anyone who used ’computer hacking’ in order to source stories, or for any reason.

Answer: I am not aware that any NI title has ever used or commissioned anyone who used “computer hacking” in order to source stories. I have been made aware of one instance on The Times in 2009 which I understand may have involved a journalist attempting to access information in this way. However, I also understand that this was an act of the journalist and was not authorised by TNL. As such, I understand it resulted in the journalist concerned being disciplined.

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Posted: 17th, January 2012 | In: Reviews | Comment


Will Kate Midelton get Pippa Middleton’s bum on the NHS?

LAST week, the Daily Mail picture editor Paul Silva told the Leveson Inqurty that he receives between 300 and 400 pictures of Pippa Middleton every week.

Pippa’s and her bum have been huge talking points ever since both attended the Royal wedding. Silva doesn’t say how many photos of Kate Middleton appear on his desk every seven days but we’d wager its fewer than Pippa’s haul. As such, we urge Kate to see a cosmetic surgeon and get Pippa’s bottom. We’d all appreciate it, and it would add a rich variety to Mr Silva’s workload…

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Posted: 13th, January 2012 | In: Royal Family | Comments (3)


Leveson Inquiry: Richard Desmond and Peter Hill on Madeleine McCann and live blogs

RICHARD Desmond has taken the stand at the Leveson Inquiry – and the main topic of his Q and A was Madeleine McCann. Before him was Peter Hill, former editor of the Daily Express, “who was in charge during the disappearance of Madeleine McCann“, notes the Telegraph. Our Maddie now defines journalists’ careers.

Peter Hill:

* Hill says the vanishing of Madeleine McCann was the biggest story event he had seen in 50 years.

Says he:

* “It was not a story that you could ignore and you simply had to cover it as best as possible.”

* “I did not accuse them of killing their child.”

* ”The story that I ran were the people that did accuse them and those were the Portuguese police.”

* “It was nothing to do with an obsession, it was more to do with a method of working”.

* “There was an enormous clamour for information and I felt this story was something which should keep running.”

Richard Desmond owner of Express Newspapers, OK!, New and Star magazines.

* “Every paper was doing the same thing, which is why every paper or most papers paid money to the McCanns. Only we were scapegoated by the ex-chairman of the PCC”

* He says Peter Hill, then his editor at the Express, was vilified for “printing the facts” about the McCann case.

Telegraph live blog (Andy Bloxham):

To summarise, Desmond has just claimed that the McCanns must have been happy about coverage in the Daily Express because they did not complain for weeks, then only decided to sue when they got a new team of lawyers. He says the McCanns were happy to have the articles printed about Maddie but says that it was only when “new lawyers” came along that the situation changed, “that’s a fact”. Jay is angrier than I’ve seen him appear in saying his claims are outrageous that the McCanns weren’t upset by the coverage.

Robert Jay QC: “Your newspaper had accused them of killing their daughter. Are you seriously saying they were ‘quite happy’?”

Sky Blog:

Court 73 turns into a maths lesson as Desmond works out that of 102 articles on McCanns only 38 were ‘bad ones’ ie defamatory #leveson

Guardian live blog:

* Desmond: “On your figure, we ran 102 articles for four months, nothing happened until a new firm of lawyers – who were on contingency – then came in to sue us.”

* Desmond: “Once again I do apologise. I am very sorry that we got it wrong … every paper was doing the same thing, which is why every paper paid money to the McCanns. But only we were scapegoated by the PCC.”

* Desmond tries to justify his papers’ McCanns coverage because he says there was different points of view about what might have happened. “There has been speculation that Diana was killed by the royal family,” he says. The speculation has gone on and on. I don’t know the answer. I apologise again to the McCanns etc etc etc, but there are views about the McCanns and what happened,” he adds.

* Leveson: “…there is no comparison between Madeleine McCann and Diana. In the case of Diana we have a dead body.”

* Jay points out that the logic of that argument is that the paper could write anything it liked. Desmond says he’s not advocating that.

* Desmond apologises to the McCanns over his papers’ coverage.

* “I don’t wish to minimise it … and I’m not trying to win points here, but if there were 102 articles on the McCanns, and 38 bad ones … you could argue there were 68 or 70 good ones.”

* Desmond emphasises again that he isn’t wishing to play down the effect of the bad stories.

* Desmond: “Every paper, every day, for that amount of time, was talking about that story. Poor old Peter Hill … I remember calling him that night, I spoke to him for about two hours, because he’d done it to the best ability, reported the facts. Unfortunately, it was fair to assume that the Portuguese police were a reliable source.”

* Desmond says he didn’t think the stories boosted circulation.

Desmond: “With respect to journalists, (putting money and DVD giveaways on the front cover) is the only way you increase circulation”

Hacked Off Live Blog

* Jay accuses Desmond of making a “grotesque characterisation” of the McCanns, as he says it took a long time for the family to get involved in legal dispute with the press.

* Desmond says: “Everybody was interested in the McCanns, and everybody had a view on the McCanns”.

* He adds newspaper editors “have to believe” that circulation goes up with big stories, countering Peter Hill’s claims about boosts when running stories on the McCanns.

* He tells Leveson: “This inquiry is probably the worst thing that’s happened to newspapers in my lifetime”.

Ends.

Posted: 12th, January 2012 | In: Madeleine McCann | Comment


Leveson Inquiry: The Guardian and Daily Mail have different versions of the Steve Whittamore story

THE Mail on Sunday’s editor Peter Wright told the Leveson Inquiry into media standards that reporters from his newspaper continued using convicted private investigator Steve Whittamore after his March 2003 arrest on suspicion of trading illegally obtained information with the press and magazines. Whittamore was investigated as part of an Information Commissioner’s Office investigation into the illegal purchase of confidential information named Operation Motorman.

Lord Justice Leveson said:

“Mr Whittamore had collected together a vast amount of personal data.The documents identify the names of titles, specify journalists at the titles apparently or inferentially making the requests. It identifies the names of people from a wide range of public life and in the public eye, and provides addresses, telephone numbers, mobile telephone numbers and charging details for that information.”

The Mail and MoS continued using Whittamore until September 2004. In 2005, Whittamore was was convicted of illegally accessing data and passing it to journalists.

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Posted: 12th, January 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment (1)


Piers Morgan give Heather Mills her dream moment at the Leveson Inquiry (video)

AT the Leveson Inquiry into media standards former Sun reporter and editor of the News of The World and Daily Mirror Piers Morgan refused to answer questions under oath. He did listen to a voicemail left by Sir Paul McCartney for his former wife Heather Mills. But Morgan says he won’t talk about it because he wasn’t to protect his source.

Smell that, readers. That is the smell of honour.

Did Piers Morgan listen to illegally obtained voicemails.

PM: “I don’t believe so, no.”

Or as Morgan once wrote in the Daily Mirror:

“The couple had clearly had a tiff. Heather had fled to India, and Paul was pleading with her to come back.”

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Posted: 20th, December 2011 | In: Reviews | Comment


Madeleine McCann: Viscount Rothmere Fails To Explain The Daily Mail’s Omissions

MADELEINE McCann’s name has been evoked at a parliamentary committee hearing on privacy and injunctions.

Viscount Rothermere, the controlling shareholder of the Daily Mail, says he is “very deeply sympathetic to everything the McCanns have gone through“. However, he but that he stood by Paul Dacre, the Daily Mail editor-in-chief’s coverage of the missing child.

Says Rothermere:

“My paper writes about many things that give me personal cause for concern but I feel it’s my duty to allow editors the job to edit.

“If I picked up the phone every single time I disagreed with an article then I would make their job a lot harder to do. I rely on the processes within the organisation and their obeyance of them in order to run a professional outfit…

“I had personal concerns, yes. I think what the McCanns went through was very difficult for them but I did not bring up the issue with Paul Dacre, if that answers your question.”

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Posted: 13th, December 2011 | In: Key Posts, Madeleine McCann | Comment


Graham Linehan On Tony Parsons At The Leveson Inquiry

GRAHAM Linehan has been reading Daily Mirror columnist Tony Parson’s views on celebrities appearing at the Leveson Inquiry into media standards:

Says Parsons:

Tweet: “What is hard to swallow about this enquiry on hacking is that wounded celebs appear to claim parity with the parents of murdered children.”

Tweet: “Wonderful – Hugh Grant telling us what persecution looks like on the same day that three senior Khmer Rouge leaders go on trial in Cambodia.”

Tweet: “Hugh Grant makes a couple of romantic comedies and thinks that makes him Nelson Mandela imprisoned on Robben Island.”

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Posted: 3rd, December 2011 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)


Leveson Inquiry: Paul McMullan’s Quote Of The Decade: ‘Privacy Is For Paedos’

PAUL McMullan, the former News of the World Deputy Features Editor, is doing a star turn at the Leveson Inquiry into media standards.

The highlight is:

“Privacy is for paedos”

Raping children seems a bit of an extreme to secure your privacy.

But if it sells paper, then it’s all okay…

 

 

 

Posted: 29th, November 2011 | In: Reviews | Comments (2)


Leveson Inquiry: Charlotte Church’s 15-Year-Old Breasts And Chris Jefferies Hair

AT the Leveson Inquiry into media standards, Charlotte Church and Chris Jefferies have been giv ing evidence. Jefferies was given the Full Murat over the murder of Joanna Yeates. He hired Robert Murat’s lawyer and sued The Sun, the Daily Express, Daily Mail, The Daily Mirror, the Scotsman, the Daily Record and the Sunday Mirror. But not the Telegraph, which was surprising.

He speaks well. But the Guardian does not tell us what he is wearing. This is odd because in its live blog the paper reveals:

Charlotte Church is now taking the stand. Wearing a black suit and top, she looks composed.

The paper that’s not a tabloid falls down on not mentioning Church’s hair. With celebs it is all about the hair.

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Posted: 28th, November 2011 | In: Reviews | Comment


Guido Fawkes Summoned To Leveson Enquiry To Explain Alistair Campbell’s Leaked Evidence

PAUL Staines, aka Guido Fawkes,has scored himself an appearance at the Leveson Inquiry for publishing a “leak” of former Number 10 spin chief Alastair’s Campbell’s evidence to the inquiry on his order-order.com website.

Campbell alleged  evidence focuses on the Murdoch press, the Sun’s politics reporter Trevor Kavanagh, the Daily Mail’s editor Paul Dacre (why isn’t this man on a TV judging panel – he’d be brilliant) and Express owner Richard Desmond. So much the obvious for a fixer of the Left. But then Campbell, allegedly, accuses the Daily Mirror – his former employer – of  being familiar with private detectives and allegedly hacking phones of the great and the good., including Cherie Blair’s.

One allegation is that Cherie Blair’s pregnancy printed by the Daily Mirror in 1999 could have been obtained by phone hacking.

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Posted: 27th, November 2011 | In: Reviews | Comment


Leveson Inquiry: The Sun Delights In Marina Hyde’s Clanger While Biased BBC Ignores It

THE best thing in the newspaper is that Newspapers War (tabloid rules dictate that any spat is a War, so it’s a WAR). A former colleague who worked as a columnist for the Daily Mirror used to make occasional trips to the Sun’s HQ in wapping. She described it as being akin to crossing enemy lines. The WAR being waged right now is between the Guardian (the paper every internet journalist wants to write for but which loses £500,000 a day) and the Sun, which can be a fantastic read, makes money and employs the country’s best subs and TV reporter Ally Ross, a writer worth the cover price alone.

Britain’s Guardian newspaper was forced to apologise to Rupert Murdoch’s The Sun today for falsely alleging that the tabloid’s reporters doorstepped a lawyer at the phone-hacking enquiry.
In an unwelcome twist for the left-leaning paper which has led efforts to expose hacking at Murdoch’s now-defunct News of the World weekly tabloid, the Guardian admitted in court that its front-page claim was wrong.

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Posted: 27th, November 2011 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)


The Leveson Inquiry Should Ignore Gerry McCann’s Words On Super-Injunctions For Photographers

WHEN the parents of Madeleine McCann appeard at the Leveson Inquiry, Gerry McCann told it:

You should not be able to publish photographs of private individuals going about their private business without their explicit consent, signed.

What say the snappers?

Christopher Pledger has worked for, among others, the Daily Telegraph. He says:

A ban of this type would be the death of the free press in the UK. Current guidelines require that individuals should not be photographed while they have a ‘reasonable expectation of privacy’. In practical terms this means that anyone in a public place can be photographed without permission, as they cannot expect privacy in a public space. If laws were introduced requiring the written consent of an individual before they were photographed, it would mean press photographers would have to ignore events unfolding before them.

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Posted: 26th, November 2011 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comments (11)


Hugh Grant’s Thought For The Day: Incest With Liz Hurley

HUGH Grant’s thought for the day, as not told to the Leveson Inquiry:

“Sometimes, when Liz and I check into hotels we pretend to be brother and sister and then we share the double bed. The whole idea of incest is quite appealing. I find that for a month at a time I’m a eunuch. And then for the next month I’m a rapist. I never know which way it’s going to go.”

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Posted: 24th, November 2011 | In: Celebrities | Comment


Kate McCann ‘Raped’: Our Maddie Is The Media’s Favourite At The Leveson Inquiry

THE LEVESON Inquiry into press standards and phone hacking is underway. And because the media loves nothing more than reporting on the media, the thing will get lots of airtime. And Kate McCann is in the news.

The Daily Telegraph records her words under the headline:

Leveson Inquiry: Kate McCann felt ‘mentally raped’ when diary published

Rape?

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Posted: 17th, November 2011 | In: Madeleine McCann | Comments (45)