Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Protecting the Police
The constant stream of revelations coming out on a daily basis about telephone hacking are both astonishing and distressing. The idea that any newspaper might consider it to be acceptable to tap into the phones of the victims of quite horrific crimes is difficult to comprehend.
The public may have shrugged their shoulders when they heard of celebrities and politicians falling foul of these tactics, but nobody is going to tolerate the outrageous behaviour of News International journalists and others as it has unfolded in the last week. The company and its media outlets have lost public support and may find their reputation damaged beyond repair.
This morning's Daily Telegraph has a new twist. They report that Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner John Yates told the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee he believed his voicemail messages were illegally intercepted in 2005-06:
He noted that this was a ''particularly difficult time'' for Scotland Yard but said he did not know who carried out the hacking.
Former Metropolitan Police commissioner Lord Blair told the committee his home and mobile telephone numbers were found on lists obtained by detectives investigating phone hacking at the News of the World.
It seems that the audacity of the relevant journalists was unlimited and that even the Police cannot be protected from this outrage.
The public may have shrugged their shoulders when they heard of celebrities and politicians falling foul of these tactics, but nobody is going to tolerate the outrageous behaviour of News International journalists and others as it has unfolded in the last week. The company and its media outlets have lost public support and may find their reputation damaged beyond repair.
This morning's Daily Telegraph has a new twist. They report that Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner John Yates told the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee he believed his voicemail messages were illegally intercepted in 2005-06:
He noted that this was a ''particularly difficult time'' for Scotland Yard but said he did not know who carried out the hacking.
Former Metropolitan Police commissioner Lord Blair told the committee his home and mobile telephone numbers were found on lists obtained by detectives investigating phone hacking at the News of the World.
It seems that the audacity of the relevant journalists was unlimited and that even the Police cannot be protected from this outrage.
