It was Norman Lamb’s turn to appear before the Leveson Inquiry this afternoon. He dropped a bombshell in the form of handwritten notes (which you can see here) that he made of a meeting with Fred Michel of News International in 2010. The transcript is:
Wed 27/10
0900 meeting Fred Michel News International. An extraordinary encounter. FM is very
charming. He tells me News Int. papers will land on VC’s desk in next 2 weeks. They are
certain there are no grounds for referral. They realise the political pressures. He wants things
to run smoothly. They have been supportive of Coalition. But if it goes the wrong way he is
worried about the implications. It was brazen VC refers case to Ofcom – they turn nasty.
Then he talked about AV – how Sun might help the debate – use of good graphics to get
across case.
James M has met Nick –worth working on him tohe could be receptive to case. Times will
give it fair hearing.
So refer case and implication was clear. News Int turn against Coalition and AV.
The BBC covers the interview under the headline “News Corp ‘warned Lib Dems over BSkyB bid’“.
* Mary Reid is a contributing editor on Lib Dem Voice. She was a councillor in Kingston upon Thames, where she is still very active with the local party, and is the Hon President of Kingston Lib Dems.
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One Comment
In order to avoid criticism of “selective evidence”, perhaps we should also be told what had been written on the rest of the page. In the photograph, the last line appears to have something written on it.