Missing Milly Dowler's voicemail "hacked by News of the World"

[London_Calling]

What precisely can you pin on Hunt?

 

[pesh]

Watergate

 

[1%er]

For those who can not wait until tomorrow, it seems Leveson site has published lots of Rupert Murdoch stuff here.

I'll wait until tomorrow

 

[laptop]

What precisely can you pin on Hunt?

- he [Hunt] can’t instruct his officials to get back to Ofcom as he is not supposed to be aware that we have
received the letter and its content....so we have to be very careful on this.
- he feels that we should take a contradan view ~md despite being rightly outraged by Ofcom’s
suggestions, we should look at the longer-term view
- no one would expect us to accept such art undertaking with the structural remedy we have proposed: us
accepting this or a middle-way would absolutely kill the public debate still
- he asked whether we would be prepared to negotiate at all. he mentioned that if needed, there is
another week potentially to be adoed to the timetable for further negotiations with OFT and Ofcom
- he wants to think it overnight and get back first thing tomorrow morning, he doesn’t want us to jump to
conclusions too fast . ¯ ¯ " ¯

That's at the very least, very improper: the Minister offering advice on dealing with a quasi-judicial process that he's not supposed to know about.

Can we ask GCHQ to leak the actual phone call, illegally but in the public interest?

Seriously, the questioning of Hunt on this alone should be a high-temperature day.

 

[1%er]

What precisely can you pin on Hunt?

Unless the people in these emails are telling lies he was clearly engaged in dubious contacts with people he should not have been in contact with.

 

[London_Calling]

Watergate

Clever. Just letting you know I got it.

 

[teqniq]

If you're looking for an actual criminal offence, imo it feel kinda like insider dealing. I wonder if it could apply in this?

 

[newbie]

I can't. obv.

However these emails appear to show that he made explicit reference to his own actions being unlawful, yet he carried on doing them. As did Michel and JM. Certainly enough there to warrant a full investigation.

 

[London_Calling]

It's all third party and/or hearsay. Mr Michel obv. misunderstood, was too keen to impress, etc.

Atm, there is nothing you can pin to Hunt that I'm aware of.

A Whitehall leak would be helpful....

 

[newbie]

If you're looking for an actual criminal offence, imo it feel kinda like insider dealing. I wonder if it could apply in this?

as we were told at the time, and is repeated in the emails, Hunts role was judicial not political. The real judiciary seem to take a dim view of people taking the piss with their game.

 

[newbie]

It's all third party and/or hearsay. Mr Michel obv. misunderstood, was too keen to impress, etc.

Atm, there is nothing you can pin to Hunt that I'm aware of.

A Whitehall leak would be helpful....

or both Michel and Hunt being called before leveson.

Of course, a proper investigation will include all phone records...

 

[London_Calling]

Hunt will of course appear anyway. It is an Inquiry though, not a court.

 

[1%er]

The damning emails are here I don't need to post them all

But we don't know if the content is true or not

 

[London_Calling]

So, daming but may not be true. Cheers.

 

[Kaka Tim]

It might be enough for a criminal prosecution, but his credibility as a minister is utterly shredded - he cant survive.

 

[ymu]

Nick Davies, on how this will very likely kill Hunt's political career and possibly bring down the government

 

[1%er]

So, daming but may not be true. Cheers.

Who has claimed he is guilty of anything yet? We will not know until Hunt gives his version of events.

An interesting timeline here

 

[laptop]

A spokesman for the prime minister's office said Mr Cameron stood by comments that he had no inappropriate conversations with James Murdoch about the BSkyB bid and "had done nothing wrong."

here

What an interestingly specific denial.

Has Cameron issued separate denials for the rest of the family, and for each of their respective lieutenants and consiglieres?

 

[1%er]

Nick Davies, on how this will very likely kill Hunt's political career and possibly bring down the government

This is where Rupert Murdoch could really drop them in it tomorrow

Quote"
Cameron can become embroiled in two ways. First, he faces questions about whether he had any kind of involvement in handling the bid for BSkyB, particularly during the quasi-judicial process from June 2010 to July 2011. For the first timeon Monday, it was disclosed that Murdoch had raised the bid with him when they met at Rebekah Brooks's house two days before Christmas 2010. Previously, Cameron had refused to answer direct questions about what was discussed on this occasion. His opponents will be interested to know whether he really did keep his distance even as last year the bid was swept up in the political tornado around the phone-hacking scandal.

Second, and potentially even more serious, the prime minister would be in jeopardy if the alleged support for the BSkyB bid proved to be part of a bigger deal between the Conservative leadership and News Corp. In its crudest form, the suggestion is that the Murdochs used the Sun to make sure that Gordon Brown was driven out of Downing Street so that the incoming Conservative government could deliver them a sequence of favours – a fair wind for them to take over BSkyB; the emasculation of the much resented Ofcom; and a severe funding cut to their primary broadcasting rival, the BBC. End quote

This really is bullshit by JM
This was the core of the toughest exchangeson Monday, as Robert Jay QC, for the inquiry, laid out fragments of evidence that suggest this big deal was made, and concluded: "It all falls together, doesn't it?" In reply James Murdoch passionately denied that he would ever link his newspaper's endorsement of a political party to the commercial interests of his company. "I simply wouldn't do business that way."

 

[London_Calling]

Nick Davies, on how this will very likely kill Hunt's political career and possibly bring down the government

That's a ridiculous characterisation of that article Have you no shame.

People are just a little over-excited over 'your people talking to my people and getting their wires crossed'.

 

[ymu]

If your reading comprehension is that fucked, is there any point responding to your bone idle cynicism?

The article lays out the circumstantial evidence of a pre-election deal and notes that the terms of Leveson allow him to go hunting for hard evidence. I have not mischaracterised it at all, you're just too lazy to read it or too stupid to comprehend it.

 

[1%er]

It is strange that they took this away from Cable because he said he had declared war on Murdoch and then gave it to Hunt who says on his website that he is a cheerleader for Murdoch

I'd love to see Cameron's fingers in this, British politics nowadays has turned into a good old Ealing comedy

 

[shagnasty]

A couple of bookies have closed the book on hunt resigning lol

 

[London_Calling]

dp

 

[London_Calling]

Nick Davies, on how this will very likely kill Hunt's political career and possibly bring down the government

I have not mischaracterised it at all, you're just too lazy to read it or too stupid to comprehend it.

Jesus Christ

 

[ymu]

Incisive analysis there, L_C. Right up to your usual standard.

 

[1%er]

I have a healthy dislike of Lawyers but i hope this is true.
At 1pm, as Lord Justice Leveson rose for lunch and James Murdoch stepped off the stand to make a break for the high court loos, Robert Jay QC spun on his heels and mouthed to a colleague: "This is so much fun!"

Jay has given me hours of fun over the last few months

 

[laptop]

A couple of bookies have closed the book on hunt resigning lol

Capitalism has spoken

Honestly "casino" capitalism, anyway.

 

[Kaka Tim]

Comment from the spectator comments section -

"The whole thing beggars belief.
Hunt and his SPAD are complete fools if the story is even half true.
Leveson is a completely uncontrollable circus. Cameron was an idiot to create it.
Cameron is I fear heading for oblivion. As is this country when Miliband becomes PM.
I despair."

Lol.

 

[ymu]

They can't get away from the fact that those emails reveal details and timings of statements that had not yet been made and which were commercially sensitive and strictly confidential. It is irrelevant whether it was Hunt or his SPAD - although the Swan Lake email nails Hunt pretty well - cock-up or conspiracy have the same outcome as far as Hunt's political survival is concerned. Fox hung on for a week. Hunt might manage to use his appearance at Leveson to delay the inevitable, but he is surely fucked.

And that's just after Murdoch Jnr. Murdoch Snr really knows how to stick the boot in.