MEDIA | 09.07.2011

Corruption arrests send shockwaves through British tabloid journalism

 

The News of the World will run its last edition on Sunday

The former editor of the News of the World and former aide to Prime Minister David Cameron has been arrested in London over phone hacking allegations. The British tabloid newspaper will run its last edition on Sunday.

 

Andy Coulson, editor of the News of the World from 2003 to 2007, was arrested Friday, July 8, over phone hacking allegations that centered on his newspaper.

After nine hours of questioning, Coulson was released on police bail until October.

Coulson has close links to Prime Minister David Cameron and was a key figure in last year's Conservative election campaign. Coulson was forced to quit as Cameron's communications chief in January after the phone hacking allegations resurfaced.

Andy Coulson edited the paper for four years

Cameron has come under fire for hiring Coulson shortly after he resigned as News of the World editor in 2007. Coulson has denied any knowledge of phone hacking under his watch. Cameron said he took "full responsibility" for giving him a second chance.

More arrests

In a further twist, British police on Friday re-arrested the paper's former royal editor Clive Goodman over allegations of corruption. Goodman was jailed for four months in 2007 for hacking into phone messages from the royal household.

Just hours after Goodman's arrest, police raided the offices of the Daily Star newspaper, where he did occasional work as a freelance journalist. Officers seized computer material relating to Goodman.

Goodman has also been released on bail until October.

A third man, aged 63, was arrested on corruption allegations late on Friday.

Public inquiry

Cameron on Friday called for a new system of press regulation in the wake of the closure of the News of the World newspaper. He also promised a full inquiry into the phone-hacking scandal gripping the British media.

"I don't think an inquiry in itself is the answer; There have been many inquiries of late on political issues: the Iraq war for instance ... they haven't achieved that much," Richard Lance Keeble, acting head of Lincoln School of Journalism, told Deutsche Welle.

Cameron is also friends with Rebekah Brooks, Coulson's predecessor as editor of the popular Sunday paper. She is now chief executive of News International and a close confidante of Rupert Murdoch, the Australian-born media tycoon. Cameron said Friday that he would have accepted her resignation, had it been offered to him.

Murdoch's media empire spans the globe, and includes Fox Television and the Wall Street Journal in the United States, along with major broadcasting operations in Australia and Asia.

Historic closure

On Thursday, News Corp announced that Sunday's edition of the News of the World would be the last. It is the bestselling Sunday newspaper in the country, selling some 2.7 million copies a week, and has been published for 168 years.

"I was surprised; no one anywhere predicted that," said Keeble. "I think there's an element of panic going on. It's a high-risk strategy."

The News of the World was founded in 1843The News of the World has been at the center of phone-hacking claims for several years. The targets included the royal family, celebrities and politicians.

But it was the allegations that journalists hacked into the cell phones of victims of crime, terror attacks and the relatives of British soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan that sparked a public outcry, alienating readers and advertisers.

Opposition Labour leader Ed Miliband said closing the newspaper, which may well be replaced by a Sunday edition of its sister paper, The Sun, was not enough to answer the allegations.

Reaction in British press

British newspapers mourned the loss of the News of the World in Friday editorials. The Times, also part of the News International group, said "yesterday a little bit of England died, and it is a moment to mourn. At their best they produced great stories, and sometimes exposed great wrongs."

The Daily Mail ran with the front-page headline "The paper that died of shame," and bemoaned the "downfall of a fine British institution," while the Daily Telegraph opted for "Goodbye, cruel world" on its front page.

The Guardian newspaper - the only paper to have pursued the story from the beginning - was less sorry to see the News of the World go.

"It's baffling," said editor Alan Rusbridger. "No one called for the News of the World to be closed, it seems perverse."

The paper's editorial added: "That Rupert Murdoch is ruthless is a universally acknowledged truth. But his action in killing off the 168-year-old News of the World was one of the most clinical moves in his long, tumultuous career. Some would go further and say that it was one of his most cynical."

Author: Joanna Impey
Editor: Martin Kuebler