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Jeremy Hunt's Evidence

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TheNovice | 15:52 Thu 31st May 2012 | News
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sitting through this on BBC 1 - the man must be exhausted - and must say he has presented himself very well. The Murdoch empire, especially this chap Michel seem to have exerted any pressure possibe on the unfortunate Adam Smith and (surprise surprise) they do not come out in a very good light.

Councel for Leveson (Jay) is very biased, and seems to have given Blair, Campbell and Cable a much easier ride. Leveson himself is excellent as should be expected. In fact as I speak Hunt is putting Jay firmly in his place!!
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To repeat my comment from the other thread:

"You're watching a different Leveson Enquiry to me"

I don't like Blair, but at least he didn't seem like a dodger. Also, his insight was valid. He reminds you what it's like to have a professional in the Houses of Parliament.
He is fighting for his political life.

As uusual with this type of evidence, it will take a few days to digest and scrutinise before it is clear whether he has been successful or not.
He has already blamed his advisor. I suppose next he will be claiming Cameron knew all about it. The sooner Hunt is booted out the better!
Peter Cruddas, Jeremy Hunt, Andy Coulson, Sayeeda Warsi - how much more can Posh Boy Cameron take?
Sorry, man is talking with semantics, you cant have an open mind if one minute you are congratulating Murdoch and then minutes later are in charge of an enquiry potentially blocking Murdochs bid to take over SKY. The bottom line is Cameron shouldn't have appointed him and Hunt should have not accepted it. The easy thing to do was make his special advisor the fall guy.
i'll rephrase that for open mine read impartial.
well, Cameron has decided he's behaved properly, surprise surprise
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18286371
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Sorry Ed, must disagree with your comments on Blair......everything throughout his career is/was rehearsed and pre-meditated. The term Teflon was invented for him!!!

As for the other comments I don't know what more Hunt could have done, and if you listened he did not actually blame Smith, he claimed (with some evidence) that this guy Michel manipulated Smith into an untenable position. He actually spoke up for Smith. This guy Michel is a calculating piece of work (I'm being very polite), I would have liked to have seen him take on Alistair Campbell!!! They deserve each other.

Vince Cable seemed to have taken a two-faced approach to the whole thing as well.

Leveson's summing up of the situation was very good.
Not looking good for Hunt. He sent a text to James Murdoch congratulating him that the bid had got the go ahead from Brussels. When Cable upst Sky, Hunt told the Prime Minister within 10 minutes.

// On December 21, Mr Hunt sent a text message to Mr Murdoch, the boss of News Corporation, saying “Great and congrats on Brussels, just Ofcom to go!”. This refers to the bid’s successful clearance from the European Union, and the next hurdle of getting approval from the media regulator
Later that day, it emerged that Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, who was judging the bid, had told undercover reporters he was declaring “war on Murdoch”.
Mr Hunt took a call from Mr Murdoch at 4pm, who expressed his anger that the Business Secretary was showing “acute bias” against the deal.
Within 10 minutes, Mr Hunt let both the Prime Minister’s office and the Chancellor know that News Corporation was unhappy with the situation. //

Not difficult to see who was pulling the strings on this dummy.
You may not have been watching the same witness ! i thought he came across badly. He had plenty of time to rehearse his answers, and it showed, but he was driven to make some points against himself.

One example was very damaging. He acknowledged that he knew very well what quasi -judicial meant and was taken through instructions on the role, which he had read and inderstood. He was then asked about sending a message saying 'Congratulations!' to the Murdochs. This was timed at 1458. That was, he explained, congratulations on their success with Brussels but , at the tme, he was not in office.

The questioning continued along these lines:
"When were you in office?" Answer "When the PM confirmed my appointment"
And how long after 1458 was that?" "An hour". (!).
Was that congratulations a message you would have sent in office?"" No".
Did you not think you should have disclosed it?" "No."

Here is a man who thnks that his obvious enthusiasm and support for this bid was a) not preventing him from being judicial b) so irrelevant, or so much to be kept secret, that he would not have disclosed, to anyone in authority, that he was congratulating one party on something, before his appointment was confirmed. Why? Since he would not have sent that message one minute after he was confirmed as, apparently, it was not 'quasi judicial' why would he not want it known before his confirmation, unless he feared his appointment would not be confirmed? And why should that worry him (or the Murdochs)?
Cameron loyalty to his ministers once again. It don't wash...it just contaminates!

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