Hope that( if in office ) @JWhittingdale dismantles @BBC.Your aware of his scandal & are just too fucking scared. Yet you want license fees
The BBC would have known about Natalie Rowe’s claims about Whittingdale since 2014 when they started to come out into the public sphere, and mid 2015 they were published in her book.
Did Rowe contact the BBC immediately herself in early 2014? It looks like she had a falling out with the BBC, Panorama, around then over their harassment of her for an exclusive story about something.
Rowe seems to have forgiven them by the middle of 2015 and is making direct accusations about Whittingdale…and the BBC is not reporting them…….why not? Make of this what you will…..the BBC ‘holding back’, the BBC not reporting….not reporting what exactly?……#Whittingdale……in the public interest, crucial for the BBC [future?]…
Did the BBC know about Whittingdale at least by October 2015? And if so…why not report it?…..How can they attack the Press for a ‘cover-up’ conspiracy if they themselves have done exactly the same?……
Natalie Rowe @RealNatalieRowe22 Jul 2015 @JWhittingdale What a disgrace you are! You have a love of Prostitutes & drugs so leave the #BBC alone and concentrate on what you know BEST
George Osborne will today deliver a stark warning to Britain’s European partners that the UK will leave the EU unless it embarks on whole-scale economic and political reform.
“The biggest economic risk facing Europe doesn’t come from those who want reform and renegotiation – it comes from a failure to reform and renegotiate.
“It is the status quo which condemns the people of Europe to an ongoing economic crisis and continuing decline.”
“There is a simple choice for Europe: reform or decline. Our determination is clear: to deliver the reform, and then let the people decide.”
The UK would be “permanently poorer” outside the European Union, Chancellor George Osborne has warned ahead of the in-out vote on membership on 23 June.
So how times change eh? One minute it’s a reasonable and appropriate action to take to leave the EU if it remained unreformed, the next it is the end of the world if we do….and of course it is unreformed.
But then abrupt changes of tack and opinion are not unusual for Osborne….and nor is incompetence at economic forecasting and management…remember the omnishambles in 2012? Of course that was just one of many to come….2016 just the latest. But also remember the frenetic BBC analysis, the forensic way the BBC poured over every little detail so as to better embarass Osborne….as I say how times change when it comes to Osborne’s doomladen prophecy about leaving the EU, the BBC doesn’t seem too keen to ask too many difficult questions.
But let’s first consider Osborne’s opinion on how the economy is running.
In November last year things were looking up and he and Cameron were promising us the world…Here they are seeming very pleased with themselves in 2015…
But hang on, just three months later after giving us his barnstorming prediction of economic boom the forecast was suddenly turned upside down and we were heading for recession…
Chancellor George Osborne has warned he may have to make fresh cuts to public spending in next month’s Budget.
Mr Osborne told the BBC global economic turmoil and slower growth meant “we may need to undertake further reductions”…as figures showed the UK economy was smaller than expected.
Labour’s John McDonnell said it was “a total humiliation” for Mr Osborne and that the British people would end up paying for Mr Osborne’s own failures.
He accused the chancellor of having “sneaked off to China to admit what Labour have been saying for months – that his recovery is built on sand”.
“Far from paying our way, Osborne’s short-term economics means Britain is deeper and deeper in hock to the rest of the world,” he said. “He is threatening the British people with paying an even higher price for his own failures.”
And what of the 2016 budget…surely George got it right this time? Er no…..
This is another ‘omnishambles’ on an epic scale for Osborne, and he may drag the government down with him
George seems to have a little bit of trouble forecasting the economics even three months ahead…never mind forecasting the political reaction to his stunts. How can he be forecasting the prospects for our economy up until 2030, predicting an economy in ruins without the EU to prop us up?
What does the BBC think?
Have they gone in all guns blazing, tearing his figures apart and examinig them in the minutest detail as per norm with a Tory budget? Not really.
Things didn’t start well with this rather upbeat and positive spin on Osborne’s claims from Kamal Ahmed:
We also had Brillo on Sunday, slightly off thread but about the EU, tackling Tristram Hunt, asking the questions that you very rarely hear on the BBC about what the risks might be of staying in the EU such as increased immigration, economic risk of being dragged down with the EU and a forced marriage as the EU grinds inevitably towards ever-closer union taking us with it. Hunt blustered and gave us bland, sweeping answers that answered nothing really.
Back to the economic apocalypse of a Brexit and we have the BBC’s ‘Reality Check’…..which seemed merely to be playing at impartiality and in reality was just putting a positive spin on the figures.
It tells us that Osborne may be exaggerating slightly but he’s in the right ballpark…the trend is still a negative one if we leave.
The BBC tells us that it has examined the economic models used to make the predictions and…
If you are still reading, the thing to take away from this morning’s events is this: ignore the headline figures – the Treasury thinks that leaving the EU would be bad for the UK economy, reducing its output by a considerable amount.
Ah…so we’re still doomed even of you ignore the models….er….aren’t the Treasury figures based on the models so how can we ignore them, how can we judge the truth of the treasury figures without knowing if they were generated using a credible model?
What if you really want to get to grips with the models, do they stand up to scrutiny?….
If what you care about is economic modelling, then this is a perfectly respectable piece of modelling, following broadly similar methodology to the one from the Centre for Economic Performance,
Lobby journalists and MPs have reacted with bewilderment at the Treasury’s use of a number of complex mathematical equations to underpin their argument for Brexit. This much vaunted analysis was based on a “gravity model”, a device used to model “trade flows between two countries as a function of economic variables such as GDP, geographic..and cultural variables”.
Well, the Treasury’s gravity model has been discounted numerous times for its use in predicting the impact that large scale economic changes will have on the economy.
Regardless, let’s get things in perspective as the BBC guides us through the maths…
One useful thing from this Treasury report is that it helps put into context the significance of the UK’s contribution to the EU Budget. The Treasury says that the 6% of GDP in 2030 would cut tax receipts by £36bn, dwarfing the contributions to the EU. Indeed, the Treasury has reached the £36bn figure after subtracting the UK’s £7bn a year average net contribution.
See what I mean… the BBC just oozes pro-Osborne fudgery, it looks like analysis but always edges towards the pro-EU side….’We’ve examined the figures…yes, maybe slightly off, but the general thrust is correct…we’re doomed, doomed I tell you, if we Brexit!’
Or to put it in BBCSpeak:
Reality Check verdict: The precise figure is questionable and probably not particularly helpful. If you want to be influenced by economic modelling, the useful thing to take away is that the Treasury thinks leaving the EU would be bad for the economy, by an amount that would dwarf the savings from not having to contribute to the EU Budget.
So you might think leaving will mean more money but in fact…we’re doomed.
As I have said the BBC isn’t tearing Osborne a new one over his figures as they normally do, and even seem to be giving a bit of subdued cheerleading. Robinson did a decent interview though and he will be giving Gove a going over on Tuesday at some time…no doubt 08:10. Kuenssberg gives a mainly pro-Osborne analysis here being fairly dismissive of the Brexit camp.
Osborne is essentially getting away with murder here…the BBC not really holding him to account despite the rain of scorn being poured down on him and his figures from other quarters…and not much of a look back at Osborne and Cameron’s hypocrisy and failures on leaving the EU and the budgets.
Why do we get nothing like this from the BBC? Here is Nelson Fraser in the Spectator giving Osborne a going over [It will be interesting to see if Nelson gets an interview on the BBC about this…they usually drag him when he has something critical to say about Osborne’s handiwork]…
Sometimes, George Osborne’s dishonesty is simply breathtaking. Let’s set aside the way he has positioned himself over the years (if he believed that leaving the European Union “would be the most extraordinary self-inflicted wound” he might have told us – and his constituents – earlier, rather than proceeding with the farce of renegotiation). But it’s his maths, today, which shames his office – and his use of this maths to make the entirely false suggestion that the Treasury thinks Brexit would make you £4,300 worse off. For anyone who cares about honesty in politics, and the abuse (and reporting) of statistics, this is an interesting case study.
And here’s Allister Heath in the Telegraph…no prizes for guessing the thrust of the article…
Osborne’s figures are so wildly, and obviously, meant to be negative that there should be no other reaction than scorn for what is blatantly a piece of cobbled together propaganda from the Osborne run Treasury….and yet the BBC’s reaction is one of sympathetic indulgence and even endorsement….the figures may be slightly off but you know what…at least Osborne’s got some figures and they look good enough to pass a quick inspection.
As for all the fancy doodlings? What’s that old saying?…If you can’t hide it decorate it….guess that’s what’s going on here….baffling us with bullshit…
The BBC have been so busy facilitating Osborne’s latest Project Fear wheeze that we will all be several thousands pounds worse off by 2030, that it seems to have missed this, as a Biased BBC reader draws to my eye;
Why has the BBC ignored this?
Banks in the eurozone have a £715billion black hole in their books, posing serious danger to the stability of the European and global economy. In a hard-hitting report, the International Monetary Fund accused the EU of failing to address the huge problems affecting European banks.
“I thought you might be interested in the email below which was just sent out to BBC News staff. Jasmine Williams is also known as Jasmine Lawrence, and these links show what she did ahead of the European and local elections in 2014. Interesting to see the BBC promoting her just before the EU referendum!
This email is being sent to everyone in BBC News on behalf of James Stephenson, News Editor
Dear all,
I am delighted to announce that Jasmine Williams has been appointed as Deputy News Editor on a year’s attachment. She is currently an Assistant Editor on the News Channel, where she has combined editing with a substantial planning role. Jasmine has a wealth of experience working across platforms as a news editor and deployment editor on the desk, planning editor and assignment editor.
Jasmine will be sharing the weekend news editor role and the planning editor role with Toby Castle, rotating between the two sides of the job each month. She will be taking up her new role in May.
This should have been up this morning but I guess there were a few gremlins in the system……
The BBC blitzed the Leave campaign’s suggestion that the NHS would benefit from money now given to the EU being handed instead directly to the NHS without the EU taking its cut and the EU deciding how it should be spent. Here’s a couple of examples of the BBC’s coverage of the NHS and the EU…
Laura Kuenssberg laid on the subtle undermining remarks in this report….she represents it all as a Leave campaign tactical trick to fool the voters….
Senior Leave campaigners acknowledge privately that the situation is a bit more complicated than the slogan on their banners would suggest.
At a campaign event in Manchester tonight, Boris Johnson just about admitted as much to me – although the pro-Leave audience was none too pleased that the question had been put.
But they have a very clear political reason for pushing the NHS, even thought it’s not an issue you’d normally associate with the debate about the EU.
Sources in the campaign tell me that the ears of undecided voters prick up suddenly when they start talking about money that could, as they claim, otherwise be spent on the NHS.
The next part of the argument that appeals, they say, is that immigration is putting pressure on the NHS, and of course much of that strain is from EU migrants.
They argue it is the most effective way of getting undecided voters on their side.
And that is the task of the main Vote Leave campaign.
Then there is the BBC’s ‘reality Check’…reported by Tamara Kovacevic….‘ native Croatian and EU specialist ‘
But crucially those people would be unlikely to leave the UK, even if the UK left the EU.
How can she dismiss 3 million immigrants and the pressure that puts on the NHS? She is after all asking How much pressure do EU migrants put on NHS? Obviously that should take account of those here already.
Other than that quick mention she doesn’t bother with the actual pressures on the NHS that so many new patients place upon it. Last week we heard about the record figures attending A&E and doctors were on the BBC saying it was due to immigration and an older population. As always the BBC sweeps the immigration bit under the carpet.
She provides a flurry of figures about money but they can be made to say anything…we all know the truth that GP surgeries and A&E are bulging at the seams due to immigration.
She then gets onto the usual defence that the NHS needs migrant employees….well if we had fewer migrants flooding into the country the NHS would need fewer employees to look after them…its a circular thing.
Here’s the final verdict:
Reality Check verdict: There are no figures to show the exact cost to the NHS, but the three million EU citizens already here are likely to stay even if we leave the EU.
So the BBC’s little nudge? That even if you leave the EU you’ll still have all those migrants here already, so you might as well vote Stay. Which kind of misses the point….we’re already full so leaving will help to stop another 3 million coming here.
Wonder how the BBC will react to the latest from the Stay campaign…..
Many believe that businesses will move at least part of their operations to the continent of Europe to be within the EU single market.
Borrowing costs for the government could also rise as investors demand higher repayments for supporting the UK’s debts as the economy weakens.
I am told it has taken months to prepare and those that support Britain leaving the EU are likely to attack it as being government-sponsored “propaganda”.
Vote Leave immediately dismissed the report as “just the latest erroneous pro-EU economic assessment published by the government over the last 40 years”.
Treasury sources insisted to me the report was a “sober assessment”.
I am told the analysis, written by government economists, looks at three scenarios in the event of a vote to leave the EU in the 23 June referendum.
Sources have told me that each scenario had a strong negative impact on the economy, according to the report.
The 6% fall in GDP is described as the “middle option”, not the most damaging (a WTO-style deal) and not the least damaging (an EEA deal).
Under the middle option, the UK strikes a Canada-style bilateral deal with EU partners.
Writing in The Times on Monday, Chancellor George Osborne says: “Put simply: over many years, are you better off or worse off if we leave the EU?
“The answer is: Britain would be worse off, permanently so, and to the tune of £4,300 a year for every household.
“It is a well-established doctrine of economic thought that greater openness and interconnectedness boosts the productive potential of our economy.
“That’s because being an open economy increases competition between our companies, making them more efficient in the face of consumer choice, and creates incentives for business to innovate and to adopt new technologies.”
A bit tacked on the end from John Redwood criticising the claims but all in all Kamal has had a good stab at putting the government’s case I think.
Interesting to see yet more BBC follow ups and how they dissect this….as forensically and frantically as they did with the Brexit NHS claims?
Hacked off. The ultimate in cynical ploys. On the back of some pretty dodgy press activity and a small number of high profile cases, a bunch of celebrities see the big chance to bury their personal behaviour while continuing to cash in on their image. Normally if a product is shown not to be what it is claimed to be, it is a matter for the courts. Hacked off want to turn that principle on its head.
How right you are Sluff.
Hacked Off’s campaign against the Press is ongoing. There is a shedload of shady claims and half truths and outright lies from many proponents of tougher Press regulation and in the wake of Whittingdales’s fall from grace there has been a frantic scurrying to position themselves as the moral champions of those abused by the Press and to then defend themselves from the fallout as the conspiracy theories start to roll and the truth starts to emerge about motivations and agendas of those making the most noise. Qui Bono.
The BBC knew all along about the Whittingdale story, one of the world’s biggest and best resourced news gatherers had no inkling of a story that was racing around the internet and actually appeared in a book by an infamous ‘friend’ of George Osborne?…and the BBC claims it knew nothing? Not a chance in hell that the infamous friend of George Osborne didn’t contact both the BBC and the Guardian.
Did the knowledge that the Press knew of his romance effect Whittingdale’s resolve to regulate the Press? He was always sceptical about imposing heavy regulation but in 2015 made clear his wish to have a tough and independent regulator free of Press and political interference. Guess the Press ‘conspiracy’ had no effect…unless it was the BBC’s own pressure on him to over-regulate…they knew but didn’t publish, why not?
What follows is a long look at some aspects of this starting with the Moral Crusaders’ defence of themselves.
John Cleese@JohnCleese
Dearest,dearest Twits…If you care even the teeniest bit about the state of Britain,do read Byline and Zelo Street this Sunday.Explosive !!
OK, let’s do that.
Here’s the Hacked Off/Byline sniffer hound let off the leash…chasing wild goose stories, herding cats, getting his ducks in a line….a picture perfect visual representation of Tim Fenton’s methodology…..
It had to come: after all the hit jobs on website Byline Media and campaigning group Hacked Off last week, the Telegraph showed its hand, and its desperation, by summoning Andrew “Transcription Error” Gilligan to write a smear piece so amateurish in its research and construction that it has left those at both Byline and Hacked Off looking like extras in a Smash advert, rather than angrily consulting their lawyers (which may come later).
Written by Byline’s Tim Fenton it goes ‘forensically’ through the Gilligan article dismissing each claim he makes with well aimed and intellectually coherent barbs…not.
Fenton of course has close ties to both organisations though he only hints at the relationship….
Zelo Street has asked both organisations to comment, and has been given feedback from senior and reliable sources at both.
And he obviously has insider knowledge of what is going on inside the bunker…..
[ Gilligan said Byline] later admitted that Ms King’s supposed connections to the underworld were ‘rumours’ which ‘remain as yet unsubstantiated’”. No such admission has been made, and there will be further revelations.
So just how does Fenton know there will be ‘further revelations’?
Let’s just have a quick look at some of Fenton’s quibbles…..and see if they stack up to a hill of mightavbeens…
He starts well with this bit of philosophy…
Articles that have to emblazon “Truth” at their head are often nothing but.
…but immediately falls down when faced with tackling actual facts claiming…
Those campaigners [who revealed the ‘scandal’] cannot be Hacked Off, because they did not reveal the story. That was done by reporters.
Well…actually done by ex-dominatrix Natalie Rowe…but why quibble eh?
Next..
[Story] rejected by four newspapers as an intrusion of privacy”. Wrong. No reason was given. This is conjecture.
Hmmm…but they all say they didn’t publish as it would have been an invasion of privacy.
And there’s more..
Hacked Off did not claim that the Whittingdale story had been held back in order to threaten him.
There is no editorial intervention or prior restraint – this includes the first Whittingdale article by Nick Mutch, which was published solely on his initiative.
Mutch is onboard with Byline which says….Byline can reveal a year long relationship between a senior figure in David Cameron’s government and a dominatrix which potentially jeopardized government security and left ministers open to blackmail….Many have known about the scandal for years: we’ve known about this scandal for six months. We hoped the media would clean up its act. But for over a week we were alone breaking this story. It was a scary place to be.
Doesn’t sound like Byline itself had no part in the decision to publish….they clearly must have cast an eye over it and approved it after holding on to it for 6 months.
Here Fenton tries to dash something he has misread..
“Mr Mosley … has given large sums to Impress, the body seeking to become a state-backed regulator of the press”. Wrong. The Alexander Mosley Charitable Trust has given money to another charitable trust. And IMPRESS is not a state-backed regulator.
Gilligan didn’t say Impress was a state backed regulator…he said they were ‘seeking to become’.
Tim continues to argue his case….
“The site shares a number of journalists, including Mr Jukes, with Exaro, the ‘investigative website’”. Wrong. Byline does not employ journalists, and nor, as far as is known, does Exaro, so no sharing takes place.
Gilligan didn’t say Byline employed journalists just that it shares them with Exaro….ie both sites have the same journos on board….for example Byline’s manager...one Peter Jukes….and the Guardian’s/Byline’s David Hencke.
A last one…there’s so many more…
“In fact, Hacked Off issued a press release on 10 April, two days before the Newsnight story, headed ‘Whittingdale and the story no paper will publish,’ referring readers to Byline.com and claiming Mr Whittingdale ‘was potentially exposed to improper pressure from newspaper companies’”. It wasn’t a press release, but a blog post. It merely noted James Cusick’s Byline article, and scrupulously avoided repeating personal details.
Not sure how you can’t call this a press release from Hacked Off…
Any thoughts where his loyalty might lie? Wonder why he as made the association between the future of the Beeb and this revelation?
Enough of the zealot of Zelo Street.
Let’s look at the meat of Hacked Off’s claims…that Whittingdale changed his tune about Press regulation after he found out they knew about him, that section 2 of Leveson MUST be implemented and is being delayed by a government in hock to the Press, and that section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act must be activated.
First though…Hacked Off always claims that there are double locks on any ‘statutory regulation’…that a 2/3rds majority in Palriament must be found before changes can be made to laws that set up the body that regulates the Press regulator/s…the Press Recognition Panel which is set up as follows….
Under a royal charter, press regulators can apply to an independent body, the Press Recognition Panel, for the status of a recognised regulator. Once one regulator is approved, newspapers that are not members of such a body could be liable to pay both sides’ legal costs in libel, privacy and harassment claims — even where they emerge victorious in court. However, that provision in the Crime and Courts Act has yet to be brought into force.
However what Hacked Off claims is not true…what the legislation actually says is that it is 2/3rds of those who vote not 2/3rds of all members of Parliament…12 people turn up to vote…only 8 needed to change the legisaltion so that politicians can interfere in Press regulation…..
For the purpose of this Article, “approved” means that at least two-thirds of the member s of the House in question or the Scottish Parliament who vote on the motion do so in support of it.
One other point….The campaigners say that it was Whittingdale who stopped further progress on Press regulation, denying that Sajid Javid did the deed…The Financial Times disagrees…
Mr Whittingdale’s in-tray will also feature the potential implementation of the Leveson report on press regulation. His predecessor, Sajid Javid, ruled out a further role for the government, following the creation of a self-regulator, the Independent Press Standards Organisation. But one person involved in past negotiations said Mr Whittingdale would “want something to be done”, if Ipso proved inadequate.
Although the judge called for an open and transparent process of implementation, the politicians immediately took the whole matter behind closed doors. And David Cameron, who had never previously revealed such a scruple, announced that he was reluctant to legislate in any way in relation to the press, even though the Leveson recommendations carefully protected free speech.
If Whittingdale was so much under the secret control of the Press and has backed off them, how is it that he said this in October 2015….
John Whittingdale, the culture secretary, has urged the press to sign up to a tough and independent regulator, adding that the jury was still out on whether the current system was good enough.
What is needed therefore is a genuinely independent and effective system of self-regulation of standards, with obligations to the public interest. At the very start of the Inquiry and throughout I have encouraged the industry to work together to find a mechanism for independent self-regulation that would work for them and would work for the public…“regulation that is itself, genuinely, free and independent both of the industry it regulates and of political control”. Any model with editors on the main Board is simply not independent of the industry to anything approaching the degree required to warrant public confidence.
The Chair and the other members of the body must be independent and appointed by a fair and open process. It must comprise a majority of members who are independent of the press. It should not include any serving editor or politician. That can be readily achieved by an appointments panel which could itself include a current editor but with a substantial majority demonstrably independent of the press and of politicians.
So much misleading speculation and misinformation has been spread about the prospect of new legislation that I need to make a few things very clear. I am proposing it only for the narrow purpose of recognising a new independent self-regulatory system. It is important to be clear what this legislation would not do; it would not establish a body to regulate the press; that is for the press itself to do.
Hacked Off and Labour make a lot of noise about Part 2 of Leveson insisting that it is a government plot that is stopping it being implemented…..
“It was always said that we needed to get to the end of all the criminal proceedings. They’re not there yet. The end could be in sight, in that the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to investigate some of the cases, but there are still some investigations going on.
“The question about whether there should be a further inquiry is something we will need to examine, particularly in light of the findings of the courts. There have been some convictions but then there have been a lot of people who have been acquitted and have not therefore been involved.
“I am very conscious that there was that undertaking, but we need to look at it in the light of what’s happened since and that is essentially what the courts have told us.”
Leveson himself didn’t really think Part 2 was necessary as it would be too expensive and involved, not only that he believed the police were straight and honest but had made mistakes rather than there being a deep-rooted problem of corruption….
Here is an analysis from 2012 saying that Part 2 would probably never be implemented….Whittingdale was keen for it to go ahead but realised it wouldn’t….
All of this seems to suggest that the second part of the Leveson Inquiry will not take place. It seems to have escaped the attention of most but when the Prime Minister announced the official inquiry into phone hacking in July 2011 it was to have been in two parts. The report on the first part into the culture, practices and ethics of the press appeared in November 2012 and has, of course, been the subject of much debate and controversy ever since. The second part, if it happens, will consider the extent of unlawful or improper conduct within News International and other media organisations. It will also ‘examine the way in which any relevant police force investigated allegations relating to News International, and whether the police received corrupt payments or were otherwise complicit in misconduct’. However, the key factor hindering the progress of this investigation is the stipulation that, ‘part 2 of the Inquiry cannot commence until the current police investigations and any subsequent criminal proceedings have been completed.’
Indeed, in May 2012 Lord Leveson himself suggested that part 2 may never happen and predicted, accurately as it turns out, that ‘If there are [prosecutions for phone-hacking] it is likely that the process of pre-trial disclosure and trial will be lengthy so that Part 2 of this Inquiry will be delayed for very many months if not longer.’ He continued, ‘that inquiry will involve yet more enormous cost (both to the public purse and the participants); it will trawl over material then more years out of date and is likely to take longer than the present Inquiry which has not over focussed on individual conduct.’
This view disappointed John Whittingdale, the Tory MP who chaired the Commons culture, media and sport select committee inquiry into hacking at the News of the World..but in November 2012 Whittingdale said, ‘my real regret – one of the key things I wanted Lord Justice Leveson to look into – was how it was that the News of the World newsroom appeared to allow this to go on… but also how the police sat around for four years and did nothing. Those are two things which Lord Justice Leveson may never examine. Part two of the inquiry, I hear, may not ever be occurring. Therefore, it seems very strange that actually the most important questions surrounding the hacking scandal may never be properly looked into.’
In a statement, a Downing Street spokesman said: “The government has been clear that a decision on whether to undertake part two of the Leveson Inquiry will not take place until after all criminal investigations and trials related to part one are concluded. They are still ongoing.”
Lord Justice Leveson: Part 2 of my Inquiry into phone hacking may not be necessary
The first part, which has been underway since last November, is examining the “culture, practice and ethics of the press”, and will result in a report to Parliament later this year setting out recommendations for a new regulatory regime.
A second part, specifically looking into phone hacking, is due to follow at some point in the future, but the Inquiry chairman suggested it may never happen, inviting participants to consider “the value to be gained” from it
“That inquiry will involve yet more enormous cost (both to the public purse and the participants); it will trawl over material then more years out of date and is likely to take longer than the present Inquiry which has not over focussed on individual conduct.”
He said it was “undeniably a sensible strategic consideration for those who have participated in this Inquiry”.
There will be no investigation into police corruption in the wake of the phone hacking scandal after the government quietly decided to shelve the second part of the Leveson inquiry.
Senior government and judicial sources told The Times that the second part of the inquiry into press and police corruption would never see the light of day amid limited political appetite for another lengthy and expensive judicial inquiry into Fleet Street
So the government has legitimate reasons to explain the delay…ongoing court cases, the cost and time involved and the likely lack of any real benefit resulting from the inquiry.
What about Hacked Off’s other demand, that section 40 be implemented? What does section 40 do? It is supposed to impose punishing court costs on any publisher who has not signed up to the approved press regulator even if they win any case that is brought against them…..
If a publisher does not subscribe to the new self-regulator and, as a result, does not offer free arbitration to claimants, then the courts could deprive the publisher of its costs in any reasonably arguable legal claim against it, even if the publisher is successful in that litigation.
A key element of those proposals was contained in section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act. This was supported by the then chairman of the Commons Media Select Committee, John Whittingdale. So was the decision to proceed with the second part of the Leveson Inquiry once criminal trials had concluded. Since being made Culture Secretary, Mr Whittingdale has reversed his position on both these issues and intervened in the agreed arrangements.
Whether the possession of this damaging information on the Culture Secretary by the press could potentially have been a factor in his otherwise unexplained choice to intervene on press regulation and to go back on agreed Government policy
Hacked Off might think that was a ‘key element’, most people would think it entirely unjust and unnecessary regime that sets out to punish rather than create a fair system. ..
Maria Miller: My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I underline the fact that this would be the toughest press regulation that this country had ever seen. There would be a £1 million fine if someone is not a member of the self-regulatory body, as they would be subject to exemplary damages.
If the government wants the Press to sign up then put that requirement in an Act of Parliament and not try to blackmail them into doing so with swingeing fines.
Even the Guardian thinks that is unfair and wrong……
The stick designed to compel papers to accept charter recognition was a mistake. The drafters did not think through the implications.
Anyway, critics of what amounts to a government U-turn will be ignored because political pragmatism is dictating current events. Whittingdale and other senior cabinet members appear to have grasped that making publishers fund unsuccessful legal claimants is, quite simply, unjust.
All in all the Press is being regulated effectively by an independent regulator, IPSO, Whittingdale is still pressing for tough regulation and it was not he who said the government would have no further role in regulation.
The controversy surrounding Culture Secretary John Whittingdale today underlines how wrong he was, as a minister, to involve himself directly in the business of press regulation – something the Leveson Report explicitly warned against. In a healthy democracy the press must be free from meddling by politicians, and Hacked Off has always been clear on this point.
Sheer hypocrisy from Hacked Off….Leveson was driven by politicians’ and Hacked Off were in bed with the lot of them, lobbying and directly guiding legislation.
The Press is being effectively regulated under IPSO but not with a government imposed Press Recognition Panel regulating them…as mentioned earlier such a regulator is vulnerable to political interference as only 2/3rds of those who vote are needed to change the legislation to suit the politicians…and they could dissolve the PRP with any vote in Parlaiment, 2/3rds or not.
Whittingdale’s comments on strengthening Press regulation last year….
John Whittingdale, the culture secretary, has urged the press to sign up to a tough and independent regulator, adding that the jury was still out on whether the current system was good enough.
In a speech at the Society of Editors conference in which he praised newspapers, particularly local ones, for holding the powerful to account, Whittingdale urged the industry to sign up to a regulator that complied with the royal charter.
He said Ipso, the year-old self-regulatory body supported by most national newspapers, was “not a million miles away” from complying with the charter agreed in the wake of the Leveson inquiry into the phone-hacking scandal.
it is a matter of concern that there are some publishers who are still outside the self-regulatory system.”
The Guardian, Observer, Financial Times and Independent titles have not joined Ipso.
“Let me be very clear,” he added. “I would like to see the press bring themselves within the royal charter’s scheme of recognition. What is key is that we should have a regulator that is tough, independent, fully subscribed and that commands confidence.”
Whittingdale also said that the imposition of costs on non-compliant newspaper groups could be delayed.
“I have to say that at the moment, I am not convinced the time is right for the introduction of these costs provisions,” he said. “Given the changes under way within the industry, the introduction of the new exemplary damages provisions, and the pressures on the industry, I question whether this additional step, now, will be positive and will lead to the changes I want to see.”
However, he added that his “mind is not made up” over the introduction of the provision.
The comments were immediately criticised by campaign group Hacked Off.
“We hope that on reflection the prime minister will remember what he pledged on oath at the Leveson inquiry, and what he personally promised victims of the press. The public will never be convinced that our political leaders have ended their servile relationship to powerful press interests like Rupert Murdoch and the returning Rebekah Brooks, until the Leveson reforms are properly implemented.”
“be[ing] a Nazi province” was preferable to becoming a British dominion. Philippe Pétain, a leader of the pro-armistice group, called union “fusion with a corpse”.
[Robinson] doctored some of the original commentary to make it fit with EU’s hagiography about its formation….It is deeply troubling that he should project such bias, at any time – but especially during the EU referendum. It seems that he deliberately chose to amplify the ‘Churchill is father of European unity’ concept.
I thought, well why not just Google it and see just how easy it is to find out about the plan. Something Nick Robinson could have done with ease……and I came up with a Wikipedia article that gives an indepth look at how the Anglo-French union came about…and you know what, it wasn’t as Robinson said here…
There’s one interview we haven’t got, it’s with the man who in many ways was the father of a united Europe. No, he wasn’t a Frenchman, he wasn’t a German, he wasn’t a Belgian, he was, in fact, the British Bulldog himself, Winston Churchill. In the desperate days of June 1940, Britain’s new wartime leader’s first instinct was to go for full political union, quite unthinkable today. Churchill’s plan, in a last-ditch effort to stop France falling to the Nazis, was that Britain and France would become a single country, an indissoluble union with one war cabinet running defence and the economy on both sides of the Channel. The British Cabinet backed it, but with one prophetic exception, they simply couldn’t stomach the idea of a single currency. Days later France fell, and with it, at that stage, the idea of political union.
Trouble is, it wasn’t Churchill’s plan, he had little to do with drawing it up…it was Frenchman Jean Monnet’s plan and as for indissoluble…it was only for the duration of the war as the British declaration made clear.
Jean Monnet is seen as the founding father of the Community which has been developing and growing since 1950 from principles and plans he defined and began to put into practice.
We have inherited Jean Monnet’s idea and it is up to us to press ahead with the historic task of building Europe.
A single Cabinet, a single army, a single nation’
In the spring of 1940, after the defeat of General Weygand’s troops, what counted most for Monnet was to ensure that the allied democracies did not break ranks in the face of the enemy. He arrived in London a few days before General de Gaulle and drafted a plan for an indissoluble Franco-British Union, a true merger of the two nations, for de Gaulle, the British Government and the French authorities in refuge in Bordeaux. The idea was to create a psychological shock and encourage the French army to get out of enemy reach and the French navy to join up with British forces and carry on the fight.
Robinson doesn’t for some reason tell us that in 1956 the french proposed yet another union…this time by Mollet not Monnet…. ‘French Prime Minister Guy Mollet proposed a union between the United Kingdom and the French Union with Elizabeth II as head of state and a common citizenship. As an alternative, Mollet proposed that France join the Commonwealth.’ British Prime Minister Anthony Eden rejected both proposals.
Ironically it was the BBC that rediscovered this proposal... The Mollet proposal was first made public in the United Kingdom on 15 January 2007 through an article by Mike Thomson published on the BBC News website…..and the French reaction in 2007?….French journalist Christine Clerc asked former French Interior Minister Charles Pasqua (Gaullist) about Mollet’s 1956 proposal. Pasqua answered, “if his demand had been made official, Mollet would have been brought to trial for high treason“
Guess Robinson picked and chose bits of history to suit a particular narrative…that of Churchill being very pro-European Union….Robinson tells us the French rejected the proposal but not just how hostile the French cabinet’s reaction was to the proposal in 1940 ...that “be[ing] a Nazi province” was preferable to becoming a British dominion. Philippe Pétain, a leader of the pro-armistice group, called union “fusion with a corpse”.
So it seems, other than for a couple of renegade Frenchman, a European Union avec Les Rosbifs wasn’t on the books except as a wartime expedient to try and keep the French on board. Guess no one was really keen on the EU then, least of all Churchill. Something Nick Robinson could easily have found out if he didn’t know already, and hard to believe he didn’t. Therefore we must conclude he was trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the BBC audience and con them into following in what Robinson tells us are Churchill’s footsteps and vote for further integration into the EU…as a remain vote would inevitably be.
In December 1939 Jean Monnet of the French Economic Mission in London became the head of the Anglo-French Coordinating Committee, which coordinated joint planning of the two countries’ wartime economies. The Frenchman hoped for a postwar United States of Europe and saw an Anglo-French political union as a step toward his goal. He discussed the idea with Neville Chamberlain, Winston Churchill’s assistant Desmond Morton, and other British officials.[1]
In June 1940, French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud’s government faced imminent defeat in the Battle of France. In March they and the British had agreed that neither country would seek a separate peace with Nazi Germany. The French cabinet on 15 June voted to ask Germany for the terms of an armistice. Reynaud, who wished to continue the war from North Africa, was forced to submit the proposal to Churchill’s War Cabinet. He claimed that he would have to resign if the British were to reject the proposal.[1]
The British opposed a French surrender, and in particular the possible loss of the French Navy to the Germans, and so sought to keep Reynaud in office. On 14 June British diplomat Robert Vansittart and Morton wrote with Monnet and his deputy René Pleven a draft “Franco-British Union” proposal. They hoped that such a union would help Reynaud persuade his cabinet to continue the war from North Africa, but Churchill was skeptical when on 15 June the British War Cabinet discussed the proposal and a similar one from Secretary of State for India Leo Amery. On the morning of 16 June, the War Cabinet agreed to the French armistice request on the condition that the French fleet sail to British harbors. This disappointed Reynaud, who had hoped to use a British rejection to persuade his cabinet to continue to fight.[1]
Reynaud supporter Charles de Gaulle had arrived in London earlier that day, however, and Monnet told him about the proposed union.[1] De Gaulle convinced Churchill that “some dramatic move was essential to give Reynaud the support which he needed to keep his Government in the war”.[2] The Frenchman then called Reynaud and told him that the British prime minister proposed a union between their countries, an idea which Reynaud immediately supported. De Gaulle, Monnet, Vansittart, and Pleven quickly agreed to a document proclaiming a joint citizenship, foreign trade, currency, war cabinet, and military command. Churchill withdrew the armistice approval, and at 3 p.m. the War Cabinet met again to consider the union document. Despite the radical nature of the proposal, Churchill and the ministers recognized the need for a dramatic act to encourage the French and reinforce Reynaud’s support within his cabinet before it met again at 5pm.[1]
The final “Declaration of union” approved by the British War Cabinet stated that[1]
France and Great Britain shall no longer be two nations, but one Franco-British Union. The constitution of the Union will provide for joint organs of defence, foreign, financial and economic policies. Every citizen of France will enjoy immediately citizenship of Great Britain, every British subject will become a citizen of France.
Churchill and De Gaulle called Reynaud to tell him about the document, and they arranged for a joint meeting of the two governments in Concarneau the next day. The declaration immediately succeeded in its goal of encouraging Reynaud, who saw the union as the only alternative to surrender and who could now cite the British rejection of the armistice.[1]
Other French leaders were less enthusiastic, however. At the 5 p.m. cabinet meeting, many called it a British “last minute plan” to steal its colonies, and said that “be[ing] a Nazi province” was preferable to becoming a British dominion. Philippe Pétain, a leader of the pro-armistice group, called union “fusion with a corpse”. While President Albert Lebrun and some others were supportive, the cabinet’s opposition stunned Reynaud. He resigned that evening without taking a formal vote on the union or an armistice, and later called the failure of the union the “greatest disappointment of my political career”.[1]
Reynaud had erred, however, by conflating opposition to the union—which a majority of the cabinet almost certainly opposed—with support for an armistice, which it almost certainly did not. If the proposal had been made a few days earlier, instead of the 16th when the French only had hours to decide between armistice and North Africa, Reynaud’s cabinet might have considered it more carefully.[1]
Pétain formed a new government that evening, which immediately decided to ask Germany for armistice terms. The British canceled their plans to travel to Concarneau.
Remarkable EVERY sentence of that Gilligan piece has an error. Every sentence
Trouble is Gilligan reveals that Byline is funded by multi-millionaire and billionaire patrons who Byline itself has boasted of…..whilst also boasting of their independence from billionaire businessmen and the corrupt media practices of the likes of the Murdoch empire….
‘Evan Harris, associate director of the campaign group Hacked Off, says people like Fenton are “a fine resource”.’
Guess Hacked Off finds his work useful. In public Hacked Off, Byline, Jukes and Fenton are at arms length but in private it is a close embrace….and let’s not forget the BBC which works in parallel with HO to pressurise the government on Press regulations. Just why is the BBC allowed to use public funds to campaign politically against its commercial and ideological rivals?
It’s a small world….a world held hostage by the rich and powerful who control the media…including the ‘rebel’ media like Byline…funded by billionaires and a close colleague of Cameron and Murdoch…LOL and all that…..one of Byline’s founders, Seung-yoon Lee, also works for World Post…. ‘He is also a contributing editor to The WorldPost, a joint partnership of The Huffington Post and Berggruen Institute on Governance.’
Arianna Huffington announces launch of World Post news website
The 1% are about to get their own publication. The digital media titan Arianna Huffington and the billionaire investor Nicolas Berggruen on Wednesday announced the launch of World Post, a comment and news website that looks set to become a platform for some of the most powerful people on the planet.
On April 8-9 2016, the Global Editors Network (GEN), The Huffington Post and Change.org gathered the best media innovators in New York for a two-day Editors Lab focused on developing innovative news prototypes.
Cohen told The Times: ‘If you are Jewish how can you vote for them? How could you? For me it would like being a Muslim and voting for Donald Trump, how could you do it? You have to feel absolutely confident that it is totally unacceptable and it won’t be tolerated and I personally haven’t felt comfortable that it is happening yet in the Labour party.’
Not often the BBC misses a chance to quote something derogatory about Trump. Corbyn on the other hand? Not so bothered with.
The BBC hasn’t been at all bothered about claims of anti-Semitism within the Labour ranks…for sure it has ‘investigated’ them but in a half-hearted, desultory manner that paid lip service to investigative journalism and the need to expose such undertones in any Party…it was a tick-box exercise designed to make it appear the BBC was genuinely doing something, it was a show trial in reverse, set up not as a political demonstration of power that quells and crushes dissent, the defendant having already been deemed guilty of course, but , the BBC’s default position being that Corbyn is innocent, the case against him is a politically motivated one trumped up by his political rivals within the party and without, it is a show trial designed not to frighten but to reassure the Public that the subject, Corbyn, is a nice guy you can trust….a show trial or a snow job by the BBC here?
Here you have a classic example of that pouring oil over troubled waters by the BBC’s Ross Hawkins. His report was on the Today programme and on the Website…Labour’s problem with anti-Semitism.
Sounds promising doesn’t it? Sounds like the BBC will be exposing ‘Labour’s anti-Semitism problem’….but no, that’s not the intent it would seem.
Corbyn, is it his fault? No, not really. You see this is being whipped up by a vociferous bunch of anti-Corbyn critics and in reality the problem was one of Ed Miliband’s making, and aaanywaay… ‘No Labour leader could be expected to vet the thousands of new members who have signed up.’ Bet that wouldn’t be the conclusion if it had been a Tory leader.
Then we get onto the real meat and bones, the real reason Corbyn faces such attacks….his political rivals are using it as a weapon to attack him…a conclusion pointedly raised by the Today Programme’s Mishal Husain….suggesting perhaps that it was all a bit of political theatre, an innocent man caught up in a political dogfight.
For some fighting Mr Corbyn’s corner, this issue is serious and real, but is also being used as a stick to beat him by his internal political enemies.
There are those who have long seen allegations of anti-Semitism as attempts to silence legitimate criticism of Israel – on which different wings of the Labour movement take passionately opposing views.
The political debate, then, is not at heart merely a row about rules or party management, but fundamental differences within Labour.
So nowt really to do with Corbyn…he couldn’t possibly know everything that was going on inside Labour, he may sympathise with terrorist groups that want to wipe Israel off the map but that’s legitimate criticism of the Zionist cause no?, and really this is a storm whipped up by a rather bitter bunch of Blairites who want to discredit Corbyn and remove him as leader. The defence rests. All charges dropped m’lud.
Trouble is that’s just not true. Corbyn and his cabal have strong links to people who express violent antipathy towards Jews, not just ‘Zionists’, and Corbyn’s elevation to party leader has brought into the party people who would normally be shown the door pretty rapidly without having to prod Labour into action.
Labour has always had this problem but Corbyn’s regime has allowed it to flourish and he has done little to stop that…therefore claims he couldn’t possibly know everything don’t merit consideration as an excuse…it is his job to ensure the rules block such people entering the Labour Party…he hasn’t bothered to do so, his half-hearted reassurances lack substance and credibility when he shares platforms and his Party with such people.
Still, why bother when he has the BBC to smooth things over for him. Nick Robinson must be proud.
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Natalie Rowe 
Peter Jukes 
Dr Evan Harris 