EmailGood Times, Bad Times – Harold Evans
Harry Evans. Photo: Felix Clay
Evans, editor of the Sunday Times in its most celebrated campaigning era in the 1960s and 70s, wrote a scathing portrait of Murdoch in his memoirs. Robert Jay, counsel for the inquiry, quoted a passage from the book in which Evans claimed Murdoch interfered in editorial matters. When Evans complained, his proprietor allegedly said: "I give instructions to my editors all round the world, why shouldn't I in London?" Murdoch was unmoved to be reminded of the episode. "I've never read the book, I'm sorry," Murdoch said.
Dial M for Murdoch – Tom Watson and Martin Hickman
Jay asked Murdoch about claims in the new book from the Labour MP, in which he alleges that he (Watson) had been called by Gordon Brown in 2009 and told that Murdoch had spoken to Tony Blair and asked him and other MPs to "back off" in their pursuit of News International over phone-hacking allegations. Jay said he didn't think Murdoch would have had time to have read the tome because it was so new, but Murdoch implied it could have come out aeons ago and he wouldn't have given it a second glance. "I'm not planning on reading it," he said.
David Yelland's book
Murdoch was asked about comments by David Yelland, ex-Sun editor. Murdoch dismissed them as "nonsense", adding: "You should take it in the context of Mr Yelland's very strange autobiography, in which he said he was drunk all the time he was at the Sun, which we didn't notice." Apropos this "strange autobiography": Yelland has only published one title, and it's not an autobiography. It's a novel for young adults called The Truth About Leo, featuring a father who recovers from alcoholism after the death of his wife – a plot not dissimilar to Yelland's own life.
Judgment in the News of the World's privacy case against Max Mosley
Mr Justice Eady
Jay asked Murdoch about Mr Justice Eady's ruling against the newspaper in 2008 over a front-page story it ran falsely accusing the then F1 boss Mosley of partaking in a "sick Nazi orgy". The judge "referred to blackmail being committed by journalists employed by the News of the World". Murdoch said that while he was aware of the judgment, he had never actually read it. This appeared to exasperate Lord Leveson, who intervened to say that the blackmail allegations were so serious that it was imperative Murdoch offered an informed opinion on the matter. "Look, I apologise, sir. I have not read Mr Justice Eady's thing," said Murdoch.. Leveson sent him away with some homework: to read the judgment and let the inquiry know his views.
Personal correspondence
Max Mosley
The inquiry heard Mosley wrote to Murdoch in 2011, pointing out Eady's assessment of a culture of blackmail at the NoW. Alas, Murdoch said he had never read the letter. "I was out of town or something and my assistant sent them to whoever was the chief executive of News International to handle and I received an email, a coded email only yesterday about it."
News of the World
Photo: Getty Images
At least not too regularly. He has repeatedly told the inquiry that he didn't pay his Sunday tabloid enough attention – until closing it down last year. "I am guilty of not having paid enough attention to the News of the World, probably throughout all the time that we've owned it," he said. More painfully for the staff who lost their jobs, Murdoch described the paper as "an aberration" for which he took responsibility.
His own submissions to Leveson
Earlier this week, an enormous batch of emails was submitted to the inquiry on behalf of Murdoch. These 163 pages revealed extensive email correspondence between Frédéric Michel, News Corp's chief lobbyist, and advisors to the government ministers Jeremy Hunt and Vince Cable. Jay asked Murdoch if we were not "surprised by the degree of apparent closeness between Mr Michel and Mr Hunt's office?" Was there nothing in the 163 pages that caused his "eyebrows to be raised"? asked Jay."I didn't read the 163 pages, I'm sorry," he said, "but I certainly tasted them, if you will".
PCC adjudications against his papers
When Leveson asked Murdoch for his views on how his newspapers could more speedily remedy errors and missteps, he said: "I'm not aware – I should be more aware of the … all the details of the PCC." I know the number of complaints that we've received, the number that have been either dismissed by the PCC, the number that have then been mediated or resolved, and the final complaints that we've had to address and apologise, which are, over a number of years, very minor," he said. But he conceded he ought perhaps to pay more interest in the future.
;