International
Murdoch’s Watergate … as BSkyB bid scuttled and Harto panics
His anything-goes approach has spread through journalism like a contagion. Now it threatens to undermine the influence he so covets.
The hacking scandal currently shaking Rupert Murdoch’s empire will surprise only those who have willfully blinded themselves to that empire’s pernicious influence on journalism in the English-speaking world. Too many of us have winked in amusement at the salaciousness without considering the larger corruption of journalism and politics promulgated by Murdoch Culture on both sides of the Atlantic.
The facts of the case are astonishing in their scope. Thousands of private phone messages hacked, presumably by people affiliated with the Murdoch-owned News of the World newspaper, with the violated parties ranging from Prince William and actor Hugh Grant to murder victims and families of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. The arrest of Andy Coulson, former press chief to Prime Minister David Cameron, for his role in the scandal during his tenure as the paper’s editor. The arrest (for the second time) of Clive Goodman, the paper’s former royals editor. The shocking July 7 announcement that the paper would cease publication three days later, putting hundreds of employees out of work. Murdoch’s bid to acquire full control of cable-news company BSkyB placed in jeopardy. Allegations of bribery, wiretapping, and other forms of lawbreaking—not to mention the charge that emails were deleted by the millions in order to thwart Scotland Yard’s investigation.
All of this surrounding a man and a media empire with no serious rivals for political influence in Britain—especially, but not exclusively, among the conservative Tories who currently run the country. Almost every prime minister since the Harold Wilson era of the 1960s and ’70s has paid obeisance to Murdoch and his unmatched power. When Murdoch threw his annual London summer party for the United Kingdom’s political, journalistic, and social elite at the Orangery in Kensington Gardens on June 16, Prime Minister Cameron and his wife, Sam, were there, as were Labour leader Ed Miliband and assorted other cabinet ministers.
Murdoch associates, present and former—and his biographers—have said that one of his greatest long-term ambitions has been to replicate that political and cultural power in the United States. For a long time his vehicle was the New York Post—not profitable, but useful for increasing his eminence and working a wholesale change not only in American journalism but in the broader culture as well. Page Six, emblematic in its carelessness about accuracy or truth or context—but oh-so-readable—became the model for the gossipization of an American press previously resistant to even considering publishing its like. (Murdoch accomplished a similar debasement of the airwaves in the 1990s with the—tame by today’s far-lower standards—tabloid television show Hard Copy.)
Then came the unfair and imbalanced politicized “news” of the Fox News Channel—showing (again) Murdoch’s genius at building an empire on the basis of an ever-descending lowest journalistic denominator. It, too, rests on a foundation that has little or nothing to do with the best traditions and values of real reporting and responsible journalism: the best obtainable version of the truth. In place of this journalistic ideal, the enduring Murdoch ethic substitutes gossip, sensationalism, and manufactured controversy.
Read Carl Bernstein’s full article on Newsweek HERE
IN AUSTRALIA:
Why in the wake of the corruption of public life by News International in the UK, is no journalist in Australia asking what is the true story behind News Corp’s hunting down of former Victorian Police Commissioner Simon Overland? ( Then there is News Corp’s virulent pro-business campaign against the Carbon Tax … )
Here is an extract of veteran Age journalist John Silvester’s report of Simon Overland’s Death by a Thousand Cuts:
…
The spat with The Australian was ugly though hardly career defining. But when the paper’s Victorian stablemate, the Herald Sun, began to attack Overland’s leadership style, the Chief Commissioner was in trouble.
A traditional supporter of law and order, the Herald Sun began to aggressively scrutinise his actions – to the point where it devoted page one on July 7 to a story that he was due to speak to a fund-raising dinner for Xavier College (his son’s former school).
The relationship with the paper further deteriorated when it was discovered that police had checked the phone records of senior reporter Geoff Wilkinson in a bid to identify his source over a story that relied on a police intelligence report.
Radio 3AW’s morning host, the influential Neil Mitchell, was another who Overland saw as a savage critic.
Eventually Overland cancelled his regular appearances on the program and Mitchell started to compare deputy commissioner Sir Ken Jones favourably to the incumbent.
The irony is that Overland’s broad vision for the future was not that far removed from his critics. He wanted more police on the beat, a flying squad to hit trouble spots, the reintroduction of promotional exams, a more disciplined force and less time spent on paperwork.
If he had survived he would have led a larger, more flexible force as the new government’s promised 1700 extra troops began to hit the streets. But he had become isolated and the government tired of the controversies that swirled around him.
A critical Ombudsman’s report on the release of police crime statistics was the final wound. If Premier Ted Baillieu and Police Minister Peter Ryan had stuck he could have survived, but they didn’t. After all, he was not one of their appointments.
There was not one incident that caused Chief Commissioner Overland to resign.
In the end, he couldn’t be heard over his critics and he knew the perception that he was under permanent attack had become the reality.
His was a death of a thousand cuts and he could not find a way to stop the bleeding.
Read the full article HERE
• For the latest news on Murdoch’s Watergate go to The Guardian, HERE
First published: 2011-07-12 01:07 PM
• Tina Brown, Daily Beast: Murdoch’s Dark Arts
News of the World shuttered, consigliere Les Hinton and the BSkyB deal at risk—can Rupert still prevail as he always has in the past?
The great cliffhanger of the Rupert Murdoch phone-hacking/bribery affair is whether this time, as always in the past, the man can once more come out a winner, however tarnished. Will the revolt to dislodge his power turn out like Egypt, where Mubarak fell, or Libya, where the tyrant has turned out to be far harder to dispatch? Is Murdoch still the Great and Powerful Oz, or just the Aussie behind the curtain?
The photographs of his arrival in London on Saturday—his gnarled, thoughtful face under a Panama hat, headed to take over crisis management from his beleaguered son James (described to me by an executive who knows him well as “always decisive, often wrong”)—will have struck fear into the hearts of students of Rupert’s dark arts. They know that he has what his critics and opponents never seem to have: a ruthless focus on the endgame—in this case, full control of British Sky Broadcasting, the lucrative satellite-TV service. He has already cauterized the wounds of the News of the World debacle with an instant shutdown, nimbly positioning himself to rebrand his weekday cash cow, The Sun, as a lean, mean seven-day tab.
We learned Sunday that Murdoch’s most trusted consigliere—Les Hinton, 67, who ran News International during the NotW editorships of flame-haired Rebekah Brooks and sudden jailbird Andy Coulson—will likely be called to an inquiry announced by Prime Minister David Cameron, according to Reuters. Hinton, who now very effectively heads up the Dow Jones & Company for Murdoch in New York, may have to explain his assurances to Parliament in 2007 that News International’s conscientious internal inquiry had shown the phone hacking was the work of one rogue royal journalist. And he may have to explain why he authorized a payment to that same supposed rogue while he was cooling his heels inside. People close to News International are now pointing out to the Financial Times that James Murdoch, who took over the U.K. company after Hinton left, now has to clean up problems that occurred on Hinton’s watch. Daddy’s back in charge, guys. Blood is thicker than water. Bye-bye, Les.
In the past the non-Murdoch 63 percent of the British press has always been too lazy, fearful, or overawed to mount a sustained attack. This time, thanks to the charge led by The Guardian, the muscular opposition of Labour leader Ed Miliband, who intends to force a Commons vote, and the sheer volume of dislodged hacking and bribery sleaze, it feels different.
Read the rest of Tina Brown in the Daily Beast HERE
THURSDAY: News Corp pulls out of BSkyB bid. The Guardian has been all over this extraordinary story for years. Stay up-to-date: HERE
Jonathan Schell, Al Jazeera: In the extensive annals of eavesdropping, all of this is something new. Not even Stalin wiretapped the dead: HERE
• As Harto desperately distances News Oz
News will investigate contributor spending in Australia
by Jason Whittaker
News Limited will examine its books in Australia to look for payments to private investigators or other parties that aren’t “legitimate services”.
As the scandal intensifies around Rupert Murdoch’s British media arm over phone hacking and the use of private investigators, Australian chief John Hartigan has written to local staff to again distance local operations from the London claims while announcing the probe into spending.
“We will be conducting a thorough review of all editorial expenditure over the past three years to confirm that payments to contributors and other third parties were for legitimate services,” he writes.
Hartigan says the company has “absolutely no reason to suspect any wrongdoing” in Australia. “However,” he writes, “I believe it is essential that we can all have absolute confidence that ethical work practices are a fundamental requirement of employment at News Limited.”
He says attempts to tie local staff to the British scandal are “offensive and wrong”, pointing to a Nine News gaff in referring to the UK arm as “News Limited”, Greens leader Bob Brown flagging an investigation into Australian practices and Crikey reports on the company’s code of conduct. Journalists from the organisation have told Crikey they did not have access to the document.
“Our code of editorial conduct is available to all journalists; indeed all staff can access it. It is on our intranets and available in hard copy. The code is given to journalists who are required to read it and abide by it as a condition of their employment,” Hartigan says.
“Yesterday I asked divisional managers to publish the editorial code on each of our masthead websites to neutralise even the most ludicrous assertions that we are somehow afraid to disclose it.
“Yesterday, HWT released an updated and expanded version of its Editorial Code of Conduct and editor in chief Phil Gardner conducted briefings to staff. HWT’s new code has been three months in preparation and its release is unrelated to events overseas. The HWT code is the most current and comprehensive we have and is likely to become the model for a new national code for News …
“Policies, codes and guidelines are important. But what matters is conduct.”
Dear Colleague,
As disturbing events continue to unfold in London I believe it is important to keep you up to date with our position in Australia.
Some media outlets, certain commentators and some politicians have attempted to connect the behaviour in the UK with News Limited’s conduct in Australia. This is offensive and wrong.
So far this week we have seen:
a major television news bulletin report that News Limited executives were suspects in the phone hacking scandal – they apologised and corrected this the following night
a federal senator call on the Government to investigate whether News Limited was engaging in phone hacking even as he admitted he had no evidence of any wrongdoing by News in Australia
the ABC report that the former head of the National Crime Authority wanted the Government to establish a new regulatory body “to ensure that Mr Murdoch’s Australian media operation was behaving responsibly”. In fact, he said no such thing; he has proposed a new press council to govern all media
accusations that we don’t disclose our code of conduct and that most of our journalists are unaware of it and that it isn’t available online – this is simply false
However erroneous the allegations, I believe it is important to deal with these perceptions constructively.
Our code of editorial conduct is available to all journalists; indeed all staff can access it. It is on our intranets and available in hard copy. The code is given to journalists who are required to read it and abide by it as a condition of their employment.
Yesterday I asked divisional managers to publish the editorial code on each of our masthead websites to neutralise even the most ludicrous assertions that we are somehow afraid to disclose it.
Yesterday, HWT released an updated and expanded version of its Editorial Code of Conduct and editor in chief Phil Gardner conducted briefings to staff. HWT’s new code has been 3 months in preparation and its release is unrelated to events overseas. The HWT code is the most current and comprehensive we have and is likely to become the model for a new national code for News.
In recent days I have had two lengthy conversations with Julian Disney, head of the Australian Press Council. Julian has brought fresh ideas, energy and conviction to the Council. He recently expanded the Council by appointing a senior person to devise a new set of National Standards. I welcome this and News will work with the Press Council and other media outlets to strengthen the Council’s ethical codes and guidelines and improve its complaints handling process.
Every worldwide employee of News Corp recently received a copy of the updated Standards of Business Conduct. These standards which are already on the News Corp website are being posted on all of our intranets.
We will be conducting a thorough review of all editorial expenditure over the past 3 years to confirm that payments to contributors and other third parties were for legitimate services.
Policies, codes and guidelines are important. But what matters is conduct.
I have absolutely no reason to suspect any wrongdoing at News Limited. However, I believe it is essential that we can all have absolute confidence that ethical work practices are a fundamental requirement of employment at News Limited.
I intend to keep you informed of relevant developments as appropriate and welcome any feedback.
John Hartigan
Chairman and Chief Executive