The Standard got the scoop:

He never liked newspapers anyway. Big test will be whether he survives the BSkyB vote on Tuesday.

The News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch was up for re-election by shareholders last week. Tom Watson MP led a campaign, backed by commercial rivals The Guardian, to unseat him from the board. Tom travelled to Los Angeles (courtesy of union subs) to vote union pension fund proxy votes. Watson’s attempt failed with Rupert Murdoch getting 86% of the shareholder vote, which compares favourably to Watson’s mere 46% of the vote in his West Bromwich East constituency at his re-election (his share of the vote sank 9.2% at the general election). To add insult to injury, News Corp shares have rocketed up 16% this month alone. Hold on to those shares comrades, no one went poor betting on Murdoch…

My one night off in LA is officially dedicated to Morrison and Lebowski. #tequila+venicebeach (should be white Russian)—
  (@tom_watson) October 22, 2011

@tom_watson is the coolest, funniest, nicest MP i've ever sung "come on eileen" with. by a wide margin—
Brian & Maria (@brian_and_maria) October 22, 2011

Never mind, in consolation he got a night out partying on tequila and singing “Come on Eileen” in La La Land…

Murdoch has been given the green light from the Culture Secretary to take over the rest of BSkyB. It came at a price though. Sort of:

“The undertakings offered would ensure that shareholdings in Sky News would remain unchanged, and indeed offer it more independence from News Corporation than it currently has.”

That same line worked during the takeover of the Times didn’t it? Murdoch only sits in on editorial meetings occasionally. Funding is secured for the loss-making channel and it will have its own board, but not everyone is convinced it will be enough. Brillo isn’t holding any punches this morning and just told Today:

“When it comes to deals, Murdoch is an Italian - The real negotiations begin once you have signed the deal. He will get his way in the end.”

Let the games begin…

As the Downing Street machine spends the week rescuing the Big Society, The Sun have given Bob Roberts and Tom Baldwin an opening to whack Dave from the right.

After two years of slagging off Murdoch’s papers, it seems Labour have remembered that people actually read them. In a piece purporting to be by Ed Miliband on crime, broken Britain is being wrestled from under the government’s nose. Never would have happened under Coulson…

Well not quite, but to a ranch in Texas in fact. Guido learns that Murdoch has secured the serialisation of George W. Bush’s long awaited “I was right all along and screw you all” book and The Times editor James Harding is flying out next week for cigars and non-alcoholic beer on the ranch. Shame no one will get to read the pay-walled interview though, just this week Harding was moaning it was a “tricky business”.