Journalist’s letter reignites hacking scandal

"Phone hacking: the smoking gun” headlines The Independent, reporting on the surveillance scandal at Rupert Murdoch’s News International group that forced the closure of the British tabloid News of the World in July. The centre-left daily devotes its front page to a scan of a letter written to News International bosses by Clive Goodman, a former journalist for News of the World who was imprisoned in 2007 for phone hacking. In it, Goodman claims that hacking was carried out “with the full knowledge and support” of senior journalists, and that it was discussed in editorial conferences.

As the Independent points out, this not only implicates Andy Coulson, the paper’s editor at the time and later David Cameron’s communications director: it also “sheds doubt on key aspects” of Rupert and James Murdoch’s evidence to a committee of MPs last month. “No excuses. No delays,” fulminates the paper’s editorial. All three men must now “be summoned back to the House of Commons to explain themselves.”