Rupert Murdoch and the Corruption of the Metropolitan Police.

News Corporation has at last replied to the allegations made in the Guardian. They have now admitted that they did pay Gordon Taylor and two other men, over £1 million over the hacking into mobile phones. This seems very generous of them as they have also said that journalists working for the organization have not hacked into anybody’s phones other than that involving Clive Goodman and the royal family.

This admission also shows that Les Hinton, the chairman of News International, lied when he told a parliamentary committee that he had carried out a full investigation into the case and he was convinced that Goodman had been acting alone. The same goes for Sir Christopher Meyer, chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, when he claimed that his investigation showed that other News of the World journalists were not involved in phone hacking.

It has also been revealed that Stuart Kuttner, the managing editor of the News of the World, approved all payments to Glenn Mulcaire, the private detective used in phone hacking. He resigned last week, however, News Corporation is claiming that this has nothing to do with phone hacking.

The real struggle over the next few weeks will be to get the High Court to the unsealing of the documents that were used to establish that the News of the World did illegally hack into Gordon Taylor’s phone. Even when the sealing of documents that prove illegal activity has taken place, courts are reluctant to act in these cases. It seems that police cover-ups have to be protected at all costs. After all, we cannot be allowed to know that we have a corrupt police-force.

The House of Commons Select Committee will try to get the police to release all the evidence they have on how News Corporation journalists obtained information by hacking into people’s phones. Apparently, parliament does not have the power to do this and as it will reveal police corruption, they are unlikely to approve this request.

One suggestion is the police were blackmailed into restricting their investigation into phone-hacking. It would not be surprising to discover that journalists working for News Corporation hold on senior figures at the Metropolitan Police.