Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
1620-1639)
MR ANDY
COULSON AND
MR STUART
KUTTNER
21 JULY 2009
Q1620 Mr Farrelly: Can I pass it
to you. Do you recognise that sort of invoicing?
Mr Kuttner: I beg your pardon?
Q1621 Mr Farrelly: Do you recognise
that form of invoicing as the managing editor?
Mr Kuttner: It looks and in fact
it clearly is what is called a self billing tax invoice.
Q1622 Mr Farrelly: It is a self billing
tax invoice?
Mr Kuttner: It is marked something
and clearly it would have said, if it were all there, something
and then "contributor" and I think possibly "self-billing
tax invoice". I am not sure who it relates to though.
Q1623 Mr Farrelly: The first two
entries are "address from telephone number" but can
I just turn you to the final page. The sixth item down relates
to a payment of £70.50 for the obtaining of an ex-directory
telephone number.
Mr Kuttner: Please bear with me
a moment. I can see £70.50, yes.
Q1624 Mr Farrelly: Would you as a
managing editor authorise that sort of payment to an enquiry agent?
Mr Kuttner: I think the answer
to that is it depends on how the enquiry agent obtained the information.
Q1625 Mr Farrelly: Presumably the
request that has gone out—and I have been an investigative
journalist although I have never had to do this, I have done it
longhand as fortunately we have been in a position in papers I
have been on to pay for this information, but this sort of request
would go out for the obtaining of an ex-directory telephone number.
It would be a specific request of an enquiry agent and the means
by which the enquiry agent gets it will inevitably have to have
as the source the telephone company.
Mr Kuttner: I beg your pardon?
Q1626 Mr Farrelly: The means by which
the enquiry agent gets the information will have to go at some
stage back to the telephone company. Have you authorised as a
managing editor payments like this?
Mr Kuttner: I have authorised
many, many, many payments where to my knowledge the work has been
done in a proper and lawful fashion. I see no evidence here that
anything has been done unlawfully.
Q1627 Mr Farrelly: That is not my
question. You would always as a matter of course as Managing Editor
ask the question whether this was in the public interest?
Mr Kuttner: Whether a specific
payment?
Q1628 Mr Farrelly: With the enquiry
for the obtaining of an ex-directory telephone number to which
payment of £70 in this but there could be other cases where
more or less had been made whether that information was sought
with a public interest defence? Would you ask that question before
authorising payment?
Mr Kuttner: On an individual item-by-item
basis?
Q1629 Mr Farrelly: Yes?
Mr Kuttner: I think that is unlikely.
Q1630 Mr Farrelly: Because our predecessor
inquiry received evidence that any such questions would have had
a public interest defence, and that was from the then Editor of
the News of the World before your tenure, Mr Coulson.
Mr Kuttner: But the authorisation
of the payment does not necessarily mean that anyone has behaved
unlawfully or that the kind of questions you just instanced have
not already been asked.
Q1631 Mr Farrelly: Mr Coulson, you
have denied also when the Guardian story came out knowing
about the Taylor settlement. That is understandable. Can I ask
you when you first learned of the Taylor litigation?
Mr Coulson: When I read about
it in the Guardian I think.
Q1632 Mr Farrelly: You had not been
informed even though this went back to April 2008?
Mr Coulson: I was not involved
in any way.
Q1633 Mr Farrelly: That Gordon Taylor
was suing the News of the World?
Mr Coulson: I was not involved
in any way.
Q1634 Mr Farrelly: Nobody from News
International communicated this to you?
Mr Coulson: No. My only knowledge
of Gordon Taylor at all was in relation to the court case. Obviously
he was one of those named in the Mulcaire case.
Q1635 Mr Farrelly: Right, so neither
by way of gossip nor chatting to old friends at the News of
the World?
Mr Coulson: I do not recall any
of it at all.
Q1636 Mr Farrelly: Or being asked
for advice?
Mr Coulson: Advice?
Q1637 Mr Farrelly: Or being summonsed
by Gordon Taylor? Nobody from April 2008 informed you that there
was any litigation in progress?
Mr Coulson: To the very best of
my recollection, no.
Q1638 Mr Farrelly: So it was news
to you when the Guardian printed that story?
Mr Coulson: Yes.
Q1639 Mr Farrelly: I find that remarkable
but we have to take your answers at face value. When Clive Goodman
pleaded guilty as the Editor of the News of the World why
did you not sack him?
Mr Coulson: Well, I thought that
an HR decision on Clive should be made once the proceedings came
to a full end. For the same reason, I resigned two weeks before
I actually left and kept it from the staff. I made that decision
two weeks before Clive's sentencing because I felt that the legal
issues had to reach their absolute conclusion.
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