guardian.co.uk,
Dan Sabbagh and Josh Halliday, Tuesday 1 May 2012
 |
| Rupert Murdoch. Photograph: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images |
Rupert Murdoch is "not a fit person" to exercise stewardship of a major
international company, a committee of MPs has concluded, in a report highly
critical of the mogul and his son James's role in the News of the World
phone-hacking affair.
The Commons
culture, media and sport select committee also concluded that James Murdoch
showed "wilful ignorance" of the extent of phone hacking during 2009
and 2010 – in a highly charged document that saw MPs split on party lines as
regards the two Murdochs.
Labour MPs
and the sole Liberal Democrat on the committee, Adrian Sanders, voted together
in a bloc of six against the five Conservatives to insert the criticisms of
Rupert Murdoch and toughen up the remarks about his son James. But the MPs were
united in their criticism of other former News International employees.
The
cross-party group of MPs said that Les Hinton, the former executive chairman of
News International, was "complicit" in a cover-up at the newspaper
group, and that Colin Myler, former editor of the News of the World, and the
paper's ex-head of legal, Tom Crone, deliberately withheld crucial information
and answered questions falsely. All three were accused of misleading parliament
by the culture select committee.
Rupert
Murdoch, the document said, "did not take steps to become fully informed
about phone hacking" and "turned a blind eye and exhibited wilful
blindness to what was going on in his companies and publications".
The
committee concluded that the culture of the company's newspapers
"permeated from the top" and "speaks volumes about the lack of effective
corporate governance at News Corporation and News International".
That
prompted the MPs' report to say: "We conclude, therefore, that Rupert
Murdoch is not a fit person to exercise the stewardship of major international
company."
James
Murdoch is described as exhibiting a "lack of curiosity … wilful ignorance
even" at the time of the negotiations surrounding the 2008 Gordon Taylor
phone-hacking settlement and into 2009 and 2010. The younger son of Rupert
Murdoch is criticised for failing to appreciate the significance of the News of
the World hacking when the "for Neville" email first became public in
2009 and during subsequent investigations by parliament in February 2010 and a
New York Times report in September 2010.
"We
would add to these admissions that as the head of a journalistic enterprise, we
are astonished that James Murdoch did not seek more information or ask to see
the evidence and counsel's opinion when he was briefed by Tom Crone and Colin
Myler on the Gordon Taylor case," the select committee said.
Even if
James Murdoch did not appreciate the significance of the £700,000 Taylor
payout, the committee concluded it was "simply astonishing" that he
did not realise that the "one 'rogue reporter' line was untrue" until
late 2010, after a previous inquiry by the culture select committee which ran
during 2009 and reported in February 2010.
According
to minutes published by the committee, the MPs were almost unanimous in their
criticism of Hinton, Myler and Crone.
Rebekah
Brooks, the former News of the World editor and News International boss, was
largely spared from the MPs' criticism. The report said that it would not draw
conclusions on evidence to the committee about Milly Dowler, the murdered
schoolgirl whose voicemail messages were hacked by the News of the World in
2002, because of an ongoing police investigation into Brooks.
However,
the MPs said that Brooks must take responsibility for "the culture which
permitted" unethical newsgathering methods over Dowler in 2002. The MPs
said: "The attempts by the News of the World to get a scoop on Milly
Dowler led to a considerable amount of police resource being redirected to the
pursuit of false leads."
Brooks is
on police bail after being arrested as part of Scotland Yard's investigation into
phone hacking on 17 July 2011 and, separately, on suspicion of conspiracy to
pervert the course of justice along with her husband, Charlie, on 13 March this
year. Brooks denies knowledge of or involvement in phone hacking or other
illegal activities.
The culture
select committee charged Hinton with being "complicit" in a cover-up
of wrongdoing at Rupert Murdoch's media empire.
MPs said
that Myler and Crone deliberately withheld crucial information and answered
falsely questions put by the committee.
The
executives demonstrated contempt for parliament "in the most blatant
fashion", the MPs said, in what they described as a corporate attempt to
mislead the committee about the true extent of phone hacking at the News of the
World.
The MPs
said that Hinton, executive chairman of News International until December 2007,
had "inexcusably" mislead the committee over his role in authorising
the £243,000 payout to Clive Goodman, the former royal editor convicted of
phone hacking in January that year.
"We
consider, therefore, that Les Hinton was complicit in the cover-up at News
International, which included making misleading statements and giving a
misleading picture to the committee," the MPs said.
Crone and
Myler were accused of deliberately misleading the MPs on the culture select
committee in 2009 and again in 2011 about their alleged knowledge that phone
hacking went beyond a single "rogue reporter" at the now-closed
Sunday tabloid.
"Both
Tom Crone and Colin Myler deliberately avoided disclosing crucial information
to the committee and, when asked to do, answered questions falsely," the
MPs said in the report.
All three
executives now face the prospect of being called to apologise before
parliament, in a constitutional move that has not been used for almost half a
century.
The report
could prove especially problematic for Myler, who is only five months into his
editorship at the New York Daily Post.
The select
committee said it would table a Commons motion asking parliament to endorse its
conclusions about misleading evidence.
News Corp
said in a statement: "News Corporation is carefully reviewing the select
committee's report and will respond shortly. The company fully acknowledges
significant wrongdoing at News of the World and apologises to everyone whose
privacy was invaded."
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