Who said perseverance never got you anywhere? After no fewer than ten days of calling his office, the Guardian diarist Hugh Muir finally got his answer to whether Eric Pickles would attend the Young Britons’ Foundation annual conference. Muir, who doesn’t like the fact YBF don’t like the NHS, ran diary story after diary story demanding an answer. There were at least four that Guido can see. Guido hears that Pickles opened his speech to the young right-wingers on Saturday with:

“I understand that a man that I’ve never met, who writes for a paper I’ve never read, is fascinated to know whether I would attend this conference. Well, I’m delighted to attend”.

What does the Guardian do when it gets a story wrong? Not just any story, but one so embellished that it forced the closure of a rival newspaper, yet has now unravelled completely. The detail that sealed the fate of the News of the World was that they had deleted Milly Dowler’s voicemails, leaving her family with false hope. Now the Guardian has conceded that fellow phone-hacker David Leigh’s allegations were way out — the voice-mails were deleted before the Screws, to their shame, went anywhere near the message inbox.

In October Rusbridger told Leveson: “We note with encouragement that, since the start of your inquiry, two other newspaper groups have decided to publish regular corrections and clarifications columns on page 2.” They quietly put their damning retreat out late on Friday night. On page ten…

How nice of the Guardian to follow Red Ed and align themselves to the Occupy movement. How sad though, for both,  that the outreach comes during the death throes of the Occupy “movement”. New York has been reclaimed for the people, with the imposters who claim to be the 99%, evicted. Perfect timing then for the Guardian Comment is Free team to have a boozy lunch and leave their site “occupied”. And it looks like they are starting at the very beginning:

A very good place to start for this lot. The lunatics have taken over the asylum!

Last year the Guardian Media Group lost over £54 million, but that didn’t stop the Editor at Large Alan Rusbridger taking home a cheeky £605,000. Revenue was down from £221 million to £198.2 millon across the group. The Guardian and The Observer’s lost £38.3 million. As a result Christmas has been cancelled. Last year all the hacks were asked for a £20 contribution to the Christmas lunch, but things have got so bad that this year there is no Christmas lunch. Not even a Winterval drink…

UPDATE:

If more people buy the Guardian then the newsroom can have Christmas lunch—
riazat butt (@riazat_butt) November 10, 2011

A classic snippet from Kevin Maguire’s column that Guido thought deserved more than New Statesman’s niche, and still declining, audience:

“Boris Johnson’s pledge to take the last of London’s bendy buses off the road by Christmas could prove costly for Zoe Williams, the Mayor of London’s foe-in-chief at the Guardian.Williams, I discovered, is a self-confessed fare dodger. Your columnist’s eye was directed to a hitherto overlooked admission in the pages of her rag. “I actually had a lot of affection for bendy buses, mainly because evading your fare was so easy that to pay was almost missing the point,” wrote Williams in May. “We used to call it ‘freebussing’. I said that to the photographer and she said: ‘But they only came in a few years ago. You weren’t 12 . . . You weren’t even a student. You were . . .’ I was 31. Can I be arrested for saying this? Ach, I will just pretend it was a joke.”

Do-as-we-say-not-as-we-do from a Guardian hack? Well, well. Perhaps Rusbridger can use the same “it was just a joke” line when it comes to their investment and tax affairs…

The police have tight rules on releasing information to the press for fear it could prejudice a trial and because over the course of an investigation police arrest suspects to eliminate them from inquiries once they determine their innocence. Occasionally a suspect’s name gets into the press. Remember Chris Jefferies, the landlord of  murdered student Joanna Yeates? Jefferies has received “substantial” libel damages from eight newspapers – Sun, Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror, Daily Mail, Daily Record, Daily Express, Daily Star and Scotsman – in relation to “seriously defamatory” allegations made against him after he was identified as a police suspect. There are often extremely good reasons for police investigations remaining confidential.

Police rules are clear:

“The release of information concerning current investigations may compromise any subsequent court proceedings. Police investigations are conducted with due regard to the confidentiality and privacy of victims, witnesses and suspects.” 

The Guardian has been making hay with the many violations of these rules by News of the World journalists. Once again the Guardian expects to be treated differently from the tabloids. The News of the World’s relationship to the Metropolitan Police was evidence of a corrupt media-police nexus, when the Guardian has an unlawful relationship with a Metropolitan Police officer it is, they froth, “a public interest investigation”. Just as when the Guardian avoids taxes offshore it is not, for some inexplicable reason, like when other firms do it. When Guardian journalists hack phones it is somehow different, journalists have to have the editor’s approval before hacking phones according to internal guidelines. The editor of the Guardian seems to think that his paper is above the law, and that he can be judge and jury when it comes to his paper hacking phones and compromising police investigations.

UPDATE: Metropolitan Police have issued a statement saying “This is an investigation into the alleged gratuitous release of information that is not in the public interest.” Quite.

Sky News is reporting that the Guardian reporter Amelia Hill has been questioned under caution after the arrest of police officer in regards of phone-hacking leaks to the paper.

If any of his journalists are charged, Rusbridger will have to walk.

Unless he’s less scrupulous than Coulson…

The bank-holiday weekend has obviously taken its toll over at the Guardian - it seems they have taken to recycling old stories. Their splash that Gove directed money to the New School Network in order to aid the free school program sounds very familiar…

The NSN charity was set up by Rachel Wolf, a former Gove adviser and housed his current SpAd Dominic Cummings when Coulson initially vetoed his appointment in May 2010. It’s all very cosy, but as Paul Waugh points out, the Guardian already reported the half a million taxpayer bung to the charity back in October. As the first free schools prepare to open their doors, are the Guardian’s going to just rehash all of their stories about them as a last ditch fight?

A Guido co-conspirator, Jon Dell, spotted this line in an old copy of Campaign!: Selling of the Prime Minister by Rodney Tyler published back in 1987. Bugging Thatcher of course wouldn’t have bothered the Guardian, it would have been “in the public interest”. As they define it…

Currently The Guardian’s David Leigh is on his high horse with Guido, claiming we’re spreading “malicious lies“ about him. So just to reiterate, last month in a telephone interview (July, 6) Guido asked Leigh a number of questions about phone hacking, specifically related to his teaching course at City University. The day we spoke with him was the day of the News International debate in parliament. We intended to run the story on that day, which would no doubt have proved a little embarrassing for Leigh, as a counterpoint. He gave an absolute denial as to ever discussing phone hacking with his students, we didn’t run our story despite having two sources, because of the vehemence of his denial. A denial which turned out to be misleading.

In the days following Leigh attacked us on Twitter and his Guardian byline was on a made up claim, a “malicious lie” even, that we had got the Smeargate emails from News International. We were convinced we were right and Guido discussed with Guardian sources (a) our story (b) his denials. Guido also alluded to Leigh in a widely reported debate held by Polis at the LSE. Within a month evidence in Leigh’s own words emerged to completely contradict his previous blanket denial to us. The only way he could justify his denial to us is if it was an honest mistake and he had simply forgotten telling his students about phone hacking.

Instead he warns Guido by email “you’ll be sorry”, something we hear all the time. The Guardian has issued a statement,

‘The Guardian does not and has not authorised phone hacking.’

Are they claiming then that David Leigh is the lone rogue reporter, like news International said of Clive Goodman? Because Leigh admits:

I’ve used some of those questionable methods myself over the years. I, too, once listened to the mobile phone messages of a corrupt arms company executive – the crime similar to that for which Goodman now faces the prospect of jail. The trick was a simple one: the businessman in question had inadvertently left his pin code on a print-out and all that was needed was to dial straight into his voicemail.

There is certainly a voyeuristic thrill in hearing another person’s private messages… when I try to explain newspaper methods to my current university journalism students, and some of whom are rather shocked. There are other techniques I have used, along with the rest of Fleet Street. I did not turn up my nose when the notorious Benjy the Binman emptied a bag of stinking rubbish on to my carpet.

Leigh freely admits to using “deceptions, lies and stings” and that it was “hard to keep on the right side of legality on all occasions”, quite. Questions arise:

• Should we be teaching the next generation of journalism students about phone hacking?
• Is it right to make them aware of illegal methods to procure information?
• Is the Guardian really in a position to be the self-appointed arbiter of media wrong doings?

Data from the Information Commissioner’s “Operation Motorman” shows that the Guardian Media Group paid tens of thousands of pounds to private detectives to illegally procure private information. The very same private detectives employed by News International…

UPDATE: According to m’learned friends there is no public interest defence for phone hacking, it is punishable with two years jail time.

It will be established over the coming months that the Guardian, far from being whiter-than-white, is as guilty as others of phone hacking. It has emerged, in the style of Piers Morgan, that David Leigh admitted to “voyeuristically” phone hacking. On July 6 this year Guido spoke to him directly and put specific allegations to Leigh that he taught a new generation of journalists, journalism students at City University, about phone hacking. He gave an angry blanket denial of the allegations – which were double sourced – so vehement were his denials that despite the double sourcing Guido held back on publication. In an effort to stand-up the story we sought a third source to no avail. Until today.

After Guido quizzed David Leigh, he had a go at us in the Guardian a few days later, claiming bizarrely that Guido’s source for Damian McBride’s Smeargate emails was News International. He also attacked us in a number of tweets for good measure.  All of which made us even more sure that we were on to something. As we said at the time:

Wondering why David Leigh is having a go at me today? It is because we are working on a story which may prove embarrassing to him.—
Guido Fawkes (@GuidoFawkes) July 11, 2011

It has now emerged that in 2006 David Leigh admitted in the pages of the Guardian, when hacking was less controversial, that he did it and just as we claimed, he taught his students about it.

There is certainly a voyeuristic thrill in hearing another person’s private messages… unlike the News of the World, I was not paying a private detective to routinely help me with circulation-boosting snippets. That is my defence, when I try to explain newspaper methods to my current university journalism students, and some of whom are rather shocked. 

David Leigh lied to Guido when we put this very allegation to him, he then thrashed about trying to tie us into News International’s sins and even uncharitably called neo-Guido a “clown”.

Some clown called Harry Cole aka Guido Fawkes says I'm having a go at him because he has an embarassing tale abt me. Dream on, son—
David Leigh (@davidleigh3) July 11, 2011

We’re laughing now.

Anyway, let bygones be bygones, David Leigh is on holiday at the moment, so Guido has emailed asking for an explanation:

David,

Perhaps, on his return, after examining his conscience, he may even consider an apology…