What Leveson Should Ask Alastair Campbell This Morning
The Leveson Inquiry has summoned the top UK political blogger, 'Guido Fawkes' - here's what he has to say on the matter
Earlier this week, prolific blogger Paul 'Guido Fawkes' Staines was summoned before the Leveson Inquiry on the British media hacking scandal. He posted a draft of a statement by the former Prime Minister Tony Blair's Communications Director, Alastair Campbell, and was ordered to remove it from his blog. Here is what he has to say on the matter:
Protecting confidential sources is crucial to the functioning of a free press. Be in no doubt that the freedom of the press is under attack in Britain. The political class are getting revenge for being exposed as expense fiddling fraudsters.
Celebrities like Hugh Grant and Steve Coogan are angry for revenge because their misbehaviour has been making the tabloid front pages. The rich and the powerful want a privacy law to shield their wrong doing from being exposed. They are exploiting widespread revulsion at the hacking of murdered young Milly Dowler’s mobile phone and other tabloid excesses to advance press regulation.
On Friday, I spoke with a London broadsheet journalist about having obtained Campbell’s draft evidence. To my surprise he told me “we have it already”. On Monday, in the course of being interviewed about the summons by another journalist from a rival London broadsheet newspaper, he told me that he personally knew one journalist to whom Alastair Campbell himself had emailed the draft “weeks ago” for their opinion.
I went back to the source the judge wants me to name and he too said the draft was in wide circulation - my source incidentally is also a journalist.
It would seem that half the journalists in London had a copy of Alastair Campbell’s draft evidence and the leak could be traced all the way back to the arch-press-manipulator himself. The reason they wouldn’t publish it is because they feared legal repercussions. This is the chilling effect of giving politically appointed judges the power to make editorial judgements.
I published Campbell’s evidence because it was a damned good story with substance. My editorial judgement was that it was in the public interest for Mr Campbell’s full allegations to see the light of day. Damn the consequences.
Lord Justice Leveson should ask Alastair Campbell if in fact he is the original source of the leak. It wasn’t a breach of computer security from the Inquiry’s lawyers, that is for sure. The documents had not been legalled - “sueing” isn’t a lawyer’s spelling.
If Britain goes down the route of a privacy law and statutory regulation of the press, judges will be empowered to be censors. It is already happening.
I was ordered to remove the story from my blog. I watched as lawyers at the Inquiry made televised menacing threats. That kind of threatening legal regime will be a boon for Dublin, and the social media industries of the future will not leave America and the protections of the First Amendment for London.
The owners of YouTube, Twitter and Facebook will look at London where judge-made media privacy laws and a ruinous libel culture are becoming oppressive and decide to go to Dublin where we have a more reasonable legal regime. On Thursday if it goes badly for me with the judge, this new media entrepreneur will be going home to Ireland permanently.
Paul Staines is the editor of the Guido Fawkes blog at www.order-order.com and he tweets at: @GuidoFawkes
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Doesnt the fact that you have to write this piece on another blog and not your own show they the judges have already won the first round?
This inquiry has the one aim of removeing the free press as the government has slowly removed free speech.
Good Luck, Paul
Should not have to say that though. It should be an assumption.
Put the draft back up as there is a legitimate public interest in its leak, it has no status with the Inquiry, and there is a further public interest in comparing the draft with the final version to see how the media feedback shaped it.
It would really help if there was a bit of context here for those of us (few and far between I know) who don't follow all the blogs all day.
Editors Note: Your wish is our command! Refresh the piece :)Paul,
I understand the pressure you must be under, it's not pleasant when the weight of the establishment comes down on you, but please for the sake of us all stick at it.
You are a warrior for freedom, and although most people don't have a clue what is at stake here, you must ignore the menaces of the liberal establishment, including a few overpaid circus performers like Hugh Grant and that Coogan fellow. They will destroy our ancient dearly-bought freedom unless someone stands up to them. The judges certainly won't. You are the last line of defence against the all-invasive power of the state that has emasculated all opposition to its totalitarian power - the professions have been picked off one after the other - as has every other association that provided a check on it. If you go, then we are truly doomed.
I turn to Guido Fawkes (and a few others) every day to find out what is really happening in the horrible world that our political masters inhabit and have created at our expense. It will be a terrible day when all we have is the BBC - the Pravda de nos jours.
They cannot control the truth & turn access to it into an occupied state zone.
Good luck Paul.
Go to it, Paul. It is beginning to look like a stitch-up by those who want you silenced. At the very least, the conduct of the inquiry so far gives doubt as to Leveson's impartiality. Put out the begging bowl if you want financial support to carry the war to the ungodly - there are a lot of people who will throw a groat your way.
Good luck. Careful that you don't overtly show up the judge for the stooge that he is - vanity ensures that he will notice it and he will rage rage rage on behalf of the machine.
What a load of tosh - the journalism that exposed expenses, NOTW etc will still be allowed, it will just be the shameful hounding of the McCanns and Chris Jefferies that will be stopped. You going back to Ireland would be an added bonus!
Why was Alastair Campbell reportedly furious that his rubbishing of the fourth estate (which is where he learned all he knows about dirty tricks) had seen the light of day? Was it because he may have laid himself open to a charge of making false accusations? I note that he is retracting some of them under cross-examination.
Hey Paul,
Have a shave and brush your teeth, put on your sunday Best with polished shoes, look that 'honourable' placeman and let rip with both barrels. More strength to your elbow sir!
Paul,
While I support a free press, I do also believe that responsibilities come with that. I agree that it is in the public interest to show Campbell's draft evidence, especially as it has been circulated widely. However I think that the responsible thing would have been to publish it after his testimony. You may have got less hits to your blog that way, but it would not have risked prejudicing an enquiry.
They really do NOT like it up them. And anything that discomfits the loathsome Campbell is, by definition, in the public interest.
I support you Guido, since if the Judge condemns you I might be next in the firing line.
The outer is a trigger for a change needed in the inner. If mr Staines is homesick..... So be it.
Really, Dave? Oh, that's all right then. I was a bit worried the lying b******s who ran up a trillion quid in debt and still found time to gouge the taxpayer for their duckponds and satellite porn might try to take advantage of the situation somehow. I know: crazy, isn't it?
By the way, I have a big metal tower in Paris you might be interested in. It's a steal at the price.
"Protecting confidential sources is crucial to the functioning of a free press. "
That's why you burn sources when it suits you personally. Fail at the first sentence. You're no hero of free speech, Staines. You position yourself so you are resistant to libel action while threatening other bloggers with dubious legal threats. Get off that high horse. It doesn't even belong to you.
Inquiries Act 2005 ================== 18 Public access to inquiry proceedings and information (1)Subject to any restrictions imposed by a notice or order under section 19, the chairman must take such steps as he considers reasonable to secure that members of the public (including reporters) are able— (a) to attend the inquiry or to see and hear a simultaneous transmission of proceedings at the inquiry; (b) to obtain or to view a record of evidence and documents given, produced or provided to the inquiry or inquiry panel.
There was no section 19 order in place on Sunday when Staines published a link to the statement. Leveson was under an OBLIGATION to make Campbell's submission public.
Isn't putting together a sworn statement with other people unlawful collusion?
This is a show trial.
You are confusing "in the public interest" and "the public will be interested". They are not the same thing at all.
"You are confusing "in the public interest" and "the public will be interested". They are not the same thing at all."
Actually, it is. It's just po-faced politicians, The Guardian, and a few select left-wing t*****s who think it's different.
What they mean with this phrase is that public should only REALLY be interested in what, say, The Guardian deigns to print. The simple, inescapable fact The Graun sells a risible number of copies proves the exact opposite.
Let the papers print what they like - just like the internet does - and let the public decide which ones they'd like to read.
Keep sticking it to them Guido. There's nothing more they would like than to neuter our so-called free press even further.
"The Guardian, and a few select left-wing t*****s who think it's different."
No - Public interest is defined as "the people’s general welfare and well being; something in which the populace as a whole has a stake.".
That clearly does not match celebrity gossip, unless "right-wing t*****s" have a different definition of it you'd like to give.
Irelands a good place to raise the kids - good luck tomorrow matey - give em hell.... wear the smiley t shirt x
England is now increasingly a legal abomination where while MP's and Judges, Bankers et al can be above the law (along with selected others who get the nod because to let them swing would be bad for the establishment's health) there is no clear challenge to their own hubris.
The London based media in all its forms is so wrapped up in establishment worship that anyone who points out the UK's self defined establishment is actually stark bollock naked with both hands in the till is clearly a bounder and has to be silenced.
To achieve this a Justice Cocklecarrot clone is wheeled out to conduct an 'inquiry' which by the end of its deliberations will have forgotten why it was deliberating in the first place. The single party state, that is the parliament at Westminster ( there are only Blue, Red and Yellow Tories in reality) will then decide what bits they want and ignore the bits which are important - like maybe they should stop leaking stuff to 'journalists' in the first place and journalists should be paid to hold the one party state to account rather than accounting for the one party state with parliamentary press releases masquerading as 'news'.
So Mr Staines - only know if you are the personification of freedom of speech or a crawling hypocrite. If the former I trust you will be leaving numerous difficult to clean or cover up stains all over Levinson
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Go to it, Paul. It is beginning to look like a stitch-up by those who want you silenced. At the very least, the conduct of the inquiry so far gives doubt as to Leveson's impartiality. Put out the begging bowl if you want financi..
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By Grumpy Old Man
Doesnt the fact that you have to write this piece on another blog and not your own show they the judges have already won the first round?
This inquiry has the one aim of removeing the free press as the government has slowly rem..
more...
By Billy Bowden is the greatest umpire ever !
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Everyone is exploiting the situtation to advance their own cause. Is this not what you do by exaggerating the effect of the Leveson enquiry's ' threats'? All leaks have sources. All journalists have a duty to protect their sources just as all those who didn't want the leak will do all they can to find them..its always been the same.