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malaise

(267,455 posts)
Tue Jun 24, 2014, 02:28 PM Jun 2014

So David Cameron's communications chief Andy Coulson was found guilty

of phone hacking.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/jun/24/andy-coulson-rebekah-brooks-phone-hacking-trial
<snip>
David Cameron's former communications chief Andy Coulson is facing jail after being found guilty of conspiring to hack phones while he was editor of the News of the World.

Rebekah Brooks, his predecessor in the job, walked free from the Old Bailey after she was cleared of all four of the charges she faced in the eight-month trial.

There were dramatic scenes outside the court as Brooks and her racehorse trainer husband Charlie, who was also cleared, left the dock.

Coulson stood emotionless as he absorbed the news. Looking faint and close to tears, Brooks walked with the support of the court's matron and her solicitor Angus McBride. Charlie, also close to tears, followed, as did her secretary, Cheryl Carter, who was also cleared.
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So David Cameron's communications chief Andy Coulson was found guilty (Original Post) malaise Jun 2014 OP
and Rebekah Brooks, his predecessor in the job, walked free! elleng Jun 2014 #1
They will all pay as this will be the final nail in malaise Jun 2014 #2

malaise

(267,455 posts)
2. They will all pay as this will be the final nail in
Tue Jun 24, 2014, 02:59 PM
Jun 2014

Cameron's campaign coffin

Ed Miliband said Cameron owed the country not just an apology but an explanation. He said "This isn't just a serious error of judgment, this taints Cameron's government There was information out there. He was warned".

In a sign of the political battle ahead, Labour's shadow chancellor, Ed Balls, accused Cameron and the chancellor, George Osborne, of a grave error of judgement in appointing Coulson as director of communications at the Conservative party and then again in 2010 appointing him to head the No 10 press operations.

Osborne had conducted the initial interview with Coulson in 2007, and made the recommendation that Cameron appoint him to run his press operation in opposition in 2008. In the House of Commons, Balls pressed ahead with an attack on Osborne during Treasury questions: "The jury has just delivered its verdict and the government's former director of communications has been found guilty of a conspiracy to hack phones," Balls said. "Does the chancellor now accept that it was a terrible error of judgement [to appoint Coulson]?".

Labour will have to judge how it responds to the trial and the verdicts. The party feels it is legitimate to press the issue of Cameron's personal judgement, but is also aware that if ii oversteps the mark, it will look to be making political capital. Downing Street senses that Cameron's misjudgement has been factored into the share price.

One of the victims of phone hacking, the former Labour home secretary David Blunkett, said the issue was not about vindictiveness or vengeance. "It is about criminality, it is about obtaining justice, and I hope that has been obtained," he said.
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