Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
1560-1579)
MR ANDY
COULSON AND
MR STUART
KUTTNER
21 JULY 2009
Q1560 Mr Ainsworth: It is not a question
of you—
Mr Coulson: I am trying to be
as upfront with you as I possibly can on this point. I have thought
long and hard about this since I left the News of the World;
I cannot pin a specific thing: "I wish I had done that and
if I had done that this would not have happened". I have
to accept, do I not, where did it all end?
Q1561 Mr Ainsworth: Is it really
the case that you are saying not only did you not know, which
is clearly the established position, but that you could not have
known?
Mr Coulson: In relation to Clive's
payments to Glenn Mulcaire, no, I would not have known about those
and could not have known.
Q1562 Mr Ainsworth: You could not
have known?
Mr Coulson: I do not think so.
I did not sign off on individual cash payments.
Mr Ainsworth: Thank you.
Q1563 Alan Keen: Mr Kuttner, how
did you see Mr Coulson fitting into the management control system?
Do you feel guilty that you left him to sink, really? Do you feel
he should have known more about the payments that were being made,
or did you feel that was not really his job and he was a journalist
first and not a manager?
Mr Kuttner: First things first:
I deeply regret the circumstances in which Andy Coulson left the
News of the World. He was a very fine editor of that newspaper
and it was a very unhappy, traumatic time for the management of
what I will call "my newspaper", although I do not edit
it. Do I think that Andy Coulson should have been told more, could
have been given more information, that I left him down? No, I
do not. He has said that he and I were deceived. There are in
life, I am afraid, people who engage in such activity. In the
grand scheme of things, with thousands and thousands of payments
for stories, pictures, features and articles and sports reports
going through our systems, and, as you have heard from previous
witnesses, the entirely valid, legitimate Mulcaire contract, a
relatively small but regrettable number of false cash payments
were created and were approved, on the whole—not always
but generally—by me, unknowing, and in those circumstances,
as I said a few moments ago, I think the arrests and what followed,
and the bringing in of the independent lawyers, right from the
start, was, in my long experience, one of the most traumatic and
unhappy events that I have known in newspapers.
Q1564 Alan Keen: I presume your background
was as a journalist before you became Managing Editor?
Mr Kuttner: I am a journalist.
Managing Editors can and may be journalists, in some circumstances.
Q1565 Alan Keen: It is the structure
we are interested in. Is there a lack of management expertise,
then, in this? What about the accountancy aspect of it? To make
large cash payments is always open to problems. We have seen,
by coincidence, Gordon Taylor, the PFA General Secretary, is involved
in some of this; and football agents are probably the worst case
example of unauthorised payments, hidden payments—
Mr Kuttner: I am sorry; I did
not catch that.
Q1566 Alan Keen: I am sorry. I am
saying that it is a coincidence that Gordon Taylor from the PFA
was involved, and football agents are probably the area where
unauthorised payments are made and that has been tightened up
tremendously by the football authorities. Where does the accountant
fit into this management structure? Surely there is somebody who
has to make sure that when the books go to the auditors in the
end that there is not anything wrong with what is going on?
Mr Kuttner: First of all, we work—particularly,
I work and managing editor colleagues work—very closely
with an internal accountant. Secondly, there are both internal
and external audits, as there are in any big company. The improper
payments were a serious but tiny percentage of the overall number
of payments that a big newspaper makes and came to light, as you
know, as a result of a very substantial police investigation.
When they did, we took a number of actions to do what we could
to prevent anything of that nature occurring again.
Q1567 Alan Keen: I understand that
as a percentage it is small. Obviously, if you are paying £50,000
to somebody as an informant or to tell a sex story that has occurred
in their life, that is a lot of money and that is not a difficult
decision to make; it is very straightforward, you are paying somebody
£20,000, £25,000 or £100,000 even, but where you
are paying somebody for getting information, that should have
been looked at, should it not much more carefully?
Mr Kuttner: It was, Mr Keen; these
things were looked at, and are looked at. Where you have long-serving,
experienced and trusted journalists coming forward—and,
I have to say, relatively occasionally in the sense that, with
perhaps one exception, there was no large pattern—with information
and saying: "Look, in order to get this information from
someone who is in a sensitive position, I need to make this payment
in cash"; where that journalist is a long-serving, relatively
senior and trusted person, with hindsight one would do all sorts
of different things but I do not have hindsight—I guess
nobody else here does either—you accept the information
being laid before you at face value, unless there is some reason
to be suspicious of it. In my experience, and as you have heard
from Andy Coulson, in his too, at the News of the World,
there was no reason to be suspicious of it.
Q1568 Alan Keen: Did Mr Coulson report
directly to you then?
Mr Kuttner: On the contrary.
Q1569 Alan Keen: What was the management
structure then? Who was Mr Coulson's boss?
Mr Coulson: Les Hinton.
Q1570 Alan Keen: So your job, Mr
Kuttner, is really more as a manager than a journalist? Is that
the case?
Mr Kuttner: As I said a few moments
ago, the way my job has operated for many years at the News
of the World has been, if you like, to bridge both the journalism
and the management; a bridge between the journalists and the management;
a bridge between managerial and admin tasks and journalism. So
that, for example, I would fairly regularly write articles for
the newspaper; I would go out, from time to time, and conduct
interviews, on the one hand, and, at the same time, I would be
overseeing the budget of the newspaper, on the other.
Q1571 Alan Keen: So Mr Coulson did
not know what payments were being made. What, Mr Coulson, was
your link with the journalist who was writing the story? Did you
not want to know where his information was coming from? Especially
if it was referring to tittle-tattle from inside the Royal family.
Did you not want to know how he got the information? Was that
not your job? If you were not part of the management of the organisation,
surely that would have been your job—to know where the actual
information came from? How the story was put together.
Mr Coulson: Sure, I took responsibility
for everything that appeared in the paper, that is the job of
an editor, but I certainly did not have the time and nor, as I
said in my opening remarks, did I micromanage every story. I certainly
did not micromanage every piece of tittle-tattle as you correctly
put it.
Q1572 Alan Keen: When we talked to
Paul Dacre a few weeks ago I think he said that the Mail Group
stopped using agents soon after the turn of the century, but you
obviously continue to use them right up until, well—has
it stopped now? While you were Editor you used agents like Mr
Mulcaire. Did you not think about stopping that practice? Did
you know that the Mail Group had stopped it?
Mr Coulson: No, I did not know
that. My understanding is that investigation agencies of this
type are used by pretty much every media company. I stand to be
corrected, I have been out of newspapers for a while, as you know,
and maybe things have changed, but my understanding is that these
kind of agencies are used by all types of media organisations,
print and broadcast.
Chairman: Philip Davies?
Q1573 Philip Davies: Mr Kuttner,
could I start with you, if I might—
Mr Kuttner: Forgive me, Mr Davies,
no discourtesy but since you are about to address me I would like
to raise a matter with the Chairman in respect of yourself. Ten
or 11 days ago—and you clearly know what is coming—
Q1574 Philip Davies: I do know what
is coming, yes.
Mr Kuttner: Your position on the
veracity of my conduct and my evidence was clearly prejudged and
in very prejudicial terms, you are quoted—and forgive me
if the Guardian got it wrong—when you say: "Stuart
Kuttner has resigned. As someone who does not believe in coincidence,
it is far-fetched to say that his resignation had nothing to do
with it." In those circumstances—and perhaps I should,
with respect Chairman, have raised this when I first sat in this
chair, I am concerned that Mr Davies is in effect acting as judge
and jury and has already made up his mind as to the reliability
of anything I say and in those circumstances I would ask that
he withdraws and takes no further part in these proceedings. I
am glad you find it a laughing matter.
Q1575 Chairman: I am sure Mr Davies
will answer for himself.
Mr Kuttner: I am glad he finds
it a laughing matter, sir, because I do not.
Chairman: However, this is not a court
and Members of Parliament are entitled to express views and it
does not in any way disbar them from asking questions in a select
committee hearing.
Q1576 Philip Davies: Mr Kuttner,
as somebody who in previous sessions, if you have been following
our inquiry closely, has been arguing in most of them that I believe
the press should have more freedom in order to express their views,
it seems quite extraordinary that you should take the view that
because I expressed an opinion with which you were not happy that
I should be barred from any proceedings, but we will let that
pass. This is an open session and everybody in the world can see
what questions I ask and everybody in the world can see what answers
you give, and I trust the public who watch it and listen to it
to come to their own conclusions, as I am sure as a journalist
you would too. I do not really see where your problem lies but
perhaps you could clear up this particular issue of your resignation
because you announced your resignation either the day before the
story in the Guardian broke or the day of it. Given that
you think that that was not linked in any way could you explain
to us why you announced your resignation at that time.
Mr Kuttner: I hear what you say
and thank you for your comments. I think that your use of the
word "think" is very revealing. I do not think that
my resignation is not linked to this matter; I know it is not
linked to this matter and, moreover, there are legal documents
in existence with News International's counsel and my own lawyers
that make that position perfectly clear, I only regret that you
clearly have a position in your mind which bears no relationship
to reality whatsoever. I do not wish to personalise it, this is
not about me, but since you said what you have said and just said
what you have said just now it is a very simple situation. Discussions
after a very long career in journalism about a retirement, a stepping
aside, a stepping down, call it what you will, had gone on for
months and arrangements were agreed quite some time before anything
appeared in the Guardian newspaper and, if you will allow
me to repeat, there are legal documents in possession of lawyers
which confirm that fact.
Q1577 Philip Davies: Sure, and I
am perfectly happy to accept that, but would you not accept that
it is slightly curious that you announced it at that particular
time? If this had been something that was on the go for quite
some time, would you not think that somebody in your position,
given the high profile nature of that story might think, "Well,
I will not announce it today of all days, I might just wait a
week before I announce it." Was there any particular reason
why you had to announce it that particular day?
Mr Kuttner: Mr Davies, why would
I delay or why would, more accurately, the announcement of my
retirement be delayed in respect of something of which I had no
foreknowledge whatsoever? I am clearly not going disabuse you,
Mr Davies, you either accept from me that there was no connection
whatsoever, and that can be easily evidenced, or you do not, and
I suspect you do not, and for the avoidance of doubt I very much
regret that.
Q1578 Philip Davies: Do you not think
though that it does raise a question that people are entitled
to ask? You are a journalist. You keep telling us that you are
a journalist, so do you not think that people are entitled to
ask questions that are begged by certain actions? If somebody
did something which raised a question, would you say to your journalist
"Don't ask the question; just accept it at face value"?
Is that really what you are saying—that I should not be
asking you this question?
Mr Kuttner: Mr Davies, you keep
in different forms of words—much like a journalist—asking
pretty much the same question. You get the straightforward answer;
you do not like it, and I am sorry you do not like it, but it
happens to be the fact of the matter and there are people in this
room who can very simply attest to that.
Q1579 Philip Davies: We are obviously
not going to make any further headway there. Have you made any
payments to either Glenn Mulcaire or Clive Goodman since they
were convicted of their offence?
Mr Kuttner: So far as I know agreements
were made with them. I have no details at all of the substance
of those agreements and so I cannot go beyond that.
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