Tuesday, April 24, 2012

#Leveson : Hunt's Position In Jeopardy After Inquiry Publishes E.Mail Exchanges With News Corp.

The position of culture secretary Jeremy Hunt is in jeopardy today after private emails between his office and News Corp were revealed at the Leveson Inquiry.

Sensitive information about the progress of News Corp’s takeover bid for BSkyB and private feedback was passed from the politician to James Murdoch, giving evidence before Lord Justice Leveson today.

This included details from a meeting between Hunt and David Cameron in July 2011 on proposed two phone hacking inquiries, which later merged to become the Leveson Inquiry, sent to Murdoch by News Corp’s head of public affairs for Europe Frederic Michel.

He wrote: “[Bid] was not discussed at the No 10 meeting that Hunt had with the PM – discussing the two enquiries [“police“ one led by a judge; and “media practices” one not with a judge and led by DCMS].”

A series of messages between Michel, Murdoch and other News Corp staff were published on the inquiry’s website after a selection were read out in court by inquiry counsel. The emails included information sent from Hunt’s advisors, Adam Smith and John Zeff, often referred to collectively as “JH”, to Michel. A list of text message exchanges between Michel, Smith and others was published alongside the email archive.

A previous email from November 2011 informed Murdoch that Hunt had received “strong legal advice” not to meet with News Corp as the takeover process was treated as a judicial decision....read more


http://hackinginquiry.org/news/hunts-position-in-jeopardy-after-inquiry-publishes-email-exchanges-with-news-corp/