access. they probably do spend too much time -- look, diary secretaries are used to to being people off and saying no, there's not enough time in the diary. i think the senior politicians need to do more of that with the media. the great thing about the whole sort of change and internet and the media and so forth are the direct channels of communication now. just as the public can shape a different media landscape so can the politicians, and they should. but i think there's a sense of them still judging their success or failure far too much on what sort of press they're getting. when i saw them, for example, the list of direct contacts there's been between this government and the murdochs since the election, michael go, for example, i couldn't believe it. wasted his time. to my mind. better things to do.

>> we will look at the future again at the end of your evidence. i've been asked to put questions to you from a list of different sources, most core participants. i'll do that now, mr. campbell. >> am i allowed to guess who they are? >> i don't really think it matters, mr. campbell. it's the question of the messenger. but feel free. paragraph 7 of your state. page 00794. in the third line you refer to taking a more strategic, a more proactive approach to communication. did this entail on occasion eck on mi e he can on mizing with the truth, which you continued to deny as an invention of the press? >> i don't think i denied them as an invention of the press but i might have dealt with them in the way i felt would best benefit the government. you have to remember my job was not -- i wasn't the press's

representative on downing street. i was the prime minister's spokesman. and he with talked earlier about the -- if you've got a room full of journalists who are being briefed by other people somewhere in the system that there's this problem and i'd be stupid if i sat there and said there wasn't a problem. but what i would do is say look, we're not going to focus on that, we're going to focus on this. we're going to focus on the budget. we're going to focus on welfare reform, whatever. it wasn't that i was denying, but i would choose my words very carefully in how i dealt with it. >> paragraph 12 now. page 00797. at the very bottom of the page you refer to the remarkable shift of opinion made by some of the murdoch titles on the issue of scottish nationalism and independence and in particular the movement of the scottish sun.

the "times" made mr. sammand man of the year. you're not suggesting some sort of causal connection there, are you, mr. campbell? or are you? >> cause between what and what? >> well, between the support the murdoch papers were beginning to give mr. samman, in particular in scotland, and the "times" making mr. samman man of the year. >> i think the -- i do think rupert murdoch decided samman was someone he wanted to be supportive of for whatever reason. alex samman probably was one of the men of that year. i'm simply making an observation. i do think there's a bigger point in that paragraph. i think the prime minister david cameron and nick clel nd and miliband are getting

disproportionately whacked at the moment because of their stance on the media. i think it's revenge for who set this inquiry up. i do believe that. and i don't think i'm alone in nap and i think the support for alex sammond is potentially related to that. >> paragraph 7 lessons to learn. 00812. this is a more general question. do you not think the government's constant attempts to repackage hold announcements, we're talking now of the labor governmen government, the government's constant attempts to repackage old announcements stories and news and put the best comcomplex on figures create a legitimate thrust in what you were saying? >> i think again -- sorry to

keep going on about the treas y treasury, but there was a time when there was so-called double accounting which was frankly stupid. this thing about reannouncing is difficult because the reality is that andrew landsly made a speech at the royal college of nursing today. i don't know whether he had any major announcements to make or not. but that would have been seen by the people who were there and there were bits on the news, largely about the hostile reaction to him. he therefore to my mind is perfectly justified in going on to another venue on another day and saying the same thing again and hoping to get coverage. is that reannouncing? i don't know. communication. what my definition of strategic communication is the communication of what you're trying to do over time. i think retaining the media's interest in that is not easy when what they keep saying is well, what's new? and when we talked earlier about the business of politicians trying to be more strategic, the

media want news 24 hours a day because that's the business that they're in. and they look to the politicians because they're the most high-profile people in the you country, possibly with the exception of footballers. they look to them to provide that news. all i'm saying is i think the politicians need to step back from that. their job is not that, their job is to govern. so does that answer it? >> paragraph 60, mr. campbell. page 00829. where you deal with special advisers. >> yeah. >> it's your experience the relationships worked well, you explain. two lines from the bottom of the page. "i would add that on any sensitive issues special advisers as senior in the system as jonathan powell and i would not do anything without general direction and often specific

checking from our employer. >> mm-hmm. >> so you can enlighten us as to what the practice was between 1997 and 2003. >> i did stay involved with tony blair and later with gordon brown. but for example, when people talk about blaming their advisers or we've talked about some of gordon's special advisers, i don't think it's enough for a politician to say well, they're freelance or they're doing their own thing. jonathan and i were both very, very senior in the system, but if we were dealing with difficult, sensitive issues we knew at all times we were representing the prime minister. and special advisers are very personal appointments by ministers or in our case the prime minister. and that's why i think there was a lot of justified skepticism

following the evidence of one of your recent witnesses. >> i've been asked by one core participant to ask you questions about the black rod incident in 2002. the death of the queen mother, which was of course in april of 2002. and provided you with a little clip, mr. campbell, of materials. can we just get the chronology right? there was a piece in the "mail" on sunday -- >> no, i think the "spectator" was the first piece. >> right. >> april the 13th. peter oborne. how tony blair tried to muscle in on the mourning. totally untrue. >> the piece certainly one of the pieces you complained about to the pcc was published in the

"mail" on sunday on the 14th of april -- >> that's correct. >> -- 2002. do you recall that? and we got a proof print of this story. downing street wanted tony blair to have a bigger role in the sermon to mark the queen mother's death. it was revealed last night. a senior blair aide telephoned blackrod and asked her if the prime minister would be able to meet the coffin when it arrived at westminster hall. sumner was told by blackwell that there was no role for mr. blair, made it clear he was not opposed to change his plan. the government officials wanted buckingham palace to reduce the lying in state from four days to three because they feared there would be insufficient numbers," paraphras paraphrased. and then toward the bottom of the page about ten lines from the bottom. blackrod, a former army officer, told her that miss

politely but firmly that mr. blair would not greet the coffin, he's seen hundreds of -- as well the plan had already been drawn up. and on the next page four lines from the top, "downing street spokesman said last night we did not suggest the prime minister's role should be changed in any way, nor did we put pressure on anyone." >> correct. >> and you then complained to the editor in the "mail" on sunday on the 15th of april 2002. >> mm-hmm. >> so this was obviously the monday morning the following day. you say in the mail on sunday yesterday simon waters repeated the false claims. so that must be reference to the earlier claim in the spectator, is that right? >> yeah. >> that downing street sought to chait royal family's

arrangements for the lying in state tone hans the prime minister's role. the prime ministers asked me to tell you that unless you print a correction and apology, which makes clear unequivocally that this story is untrue and you accept it to be untrue we'll be making a complaint to the pcc and clause 1 of the code. >> i think you made the complaint on the 24th of april, 2002 to the pcc. but there was an intervening letter from mr. wright on the 16th of april where he came out pointing, as it were. the third paragraph, "i did not believe it's in dispute clair sumner telephoned sir michael wilcox to discuss the arrangements. it's our information that mr. sumner indicated surprise that mr. blair would not be meeting the coffin and the royal family when they arrived at westminster hall. so michael told miss sumner that that was indeed the established ban, he was not prepared to

change it. in fact, you did make one change. and then mr. wright asked three questions to be answered. and finally, there was a letter by blackrod to the pcc which we see at the back of this file. it's dated the 8th of may, 2002. it came after a request by the pcc made the previous day to respond to your complaint. blackrod in this letter effectively said that there were conversations with miss sumner and the efforts were made to change the plans. would you agree with that? >> if you look at page 3 of his statement, the indented top

paragra paragraph, he writes the statement that he gave to us, that we were then able to use to rebut these totally untrue stories. he says "in the immediate aftermath of the news of the death the queen mother was tacted by the staff to brief them on the pm's role. i did so in explaining the ceremony. at no stage was i ever asked to change these arrangements." so why on earth he told us one thing when as his letter then subsequently shows he clearly for whatever reason having this discussion with simon walters. but the point is that it became impossible because the pcc said that they were not in a position where they could adjudicate on fact. and and so we with all the other things going on said this is a complete waste of time and we dropped it, which of course the press took to say oh, that means the story was true. the story was untrue then and is untrue now. i've given it -- this was sent to me yesterday. i asked the cabinet office to dig out the file. and i sent to your team the

copies of the correspondence on it from our perspective so that you do actually have the broader story. and how we handled it. >> what blackrod says toward the end of page 3, finally we come to the mail on sunday articles. here i did have contact with simon walters before publication. he came to see me on 11th april to research the story on the costs of the lying in state. operation. at the end of the interview made it clear that he had sources which in effect substantiated the underlying thrust of the "spectato "spectator's" original article. though i repeated my on the record statement i was surprised by the quality of information because i could not in truth deny the main force of his contentions. >> in which case it's very odd that he denied them on the road prior to that. so if you're interested in this you'd have to talk to blackrod because he does appear to be saying different things on the same piece of paper. all i know is that a very damaging story was run, first in the spectator, then the

standard, then the mail on sunday and the story was completely and totally untrue. clair sumner, whose job in downey street was parliamentary liaison. she had to establish what the prime minister was meant to do on an event as important as the death of the queen mother. then he goes on in his letters to say they happen to be the prime minister's protection team that advanced wherever he goes. forgive me if i don't take this as seriously as the people who wrote at the time but this story was total nonsense. >> blackrod for better or worse on the last page says i find it rather difficult to fault the mail on sunday -- >> he's obviously somebody who's very friendly with the mail on sundays and didn't want to say anything untoward about them. all i know is the story's untrue. >> then finally, i'm asked to put to you, you didn't reply to mr. wright's letters of the 12th and the 17th of june. >> i have no idea whether i did

or i didn't. >> i'd like to think they would have included them had you -- i think that's as far as i can take. >> i think blackrod ended up taking a position on the pcc but i could be wrong about that. >> pardon me, mr. cam snbl. >> i think blackrod ended up taking a position on the pcc. >> i think you may be right. >> come on, mr. campbell, don't overdo it. another question i've been asked -- >> this wasn't one of the half dozen that i mentioned earlier that always gets raised. >> the other question i've put to you -- i'm asked to put to you, excuse me, is in paragra paragraph -- of your statement.

>> yeah. >> you say "nobody with the prms prime minister's or my authority briefed the sun on election day in 2001." you look at the third volume of your diaries, page 567, entry for saturday the 31st of march, 2001. you do refer to a conversation with trevor cavener in these terms. my chat with cavener had been written hard as a june election. then you move on to a different topic. and the first call of the day was db, that's mr. blunkette saying he was pissed off it came out in a newspaper like that. or maybe he was still on the same topic, namely, the timing of the election. >> i'd have to check. but i think that refers to a story about david blunkette's position in the government. i could be wrong. because i think he was moved after the election.

but the point i make in my witness statement is valid. the sun ran a story -- look, it's obvious. now we have fixed term parmts. so this question may not arise. but the timing of the election is a story that every single political journalist is looking for the whole time. and they speculated about it all the time. the truth is we had been planning to have the election on may the 3rd and it was postponed because of foot and mouth. trevor cavener had run a story earlier saying may the 3rd, election day, official. no didn't come from us and nor did the subsequent story saying it was going to be on whatever date in june it turned out to be. and i think while i'm reflecting i was probably speaking to trevor cavener every day at this point. we were in the run-up to the election campaign. but at no point did i give anybody -- at the time anybody until the prime minister announced the election date, although by then we were frankly running out of dates.

>> but some would say that it's fairly clear from that first sentence of the diary entry that you had a conversation with mr. cavener and he certainly gained the impression from it that the election was being put back to june. >> he may well have done, but what i didn't do is brief him on the election date. >> what's the difference, mr. cam snbl. >> the difference is he phones me up and says alastair -- just imagine being in my position where i know the information. he thinks that he knows the information. he's trying to tease it out of me. and he reads body language and he reads the way that i say things. i don't want to mislead him. i never -- again, contrary to the sort of oborne thesis i never told him lies. but i sometimes didn't tell him everything that i knew. he reads the language. by then it was blindingly obvious when the election was going to be, frankly.

>> if it wasn't going to be may, wasn't going to be july because they never are in july, it's going to be june. >> it became a huge contention because the mirror became convinced we'd given them the election date. and no such thing. didn't. >> can we look to the future, mr. campbell? it's 25 to 5:00. we have time do that. you pick it up in paragraph 32 of your statement. 00813. and just some ideas which we throw out. we're not going to cover all of them. we've read your statement. you say in paragraph 34 this is a very difficult area in which to regulate. you understand that. i'm interested in paragraph 36.

>> you're suggesting there should be greater transparency. and the new regulator should be able to investigate the extent to which really opinion is being presented as fact. the extent to which they're fair and reasonable in their reporting. and the extent to which they're being sufficiently transparent in the interests which were driving their content. >> mm-hmm. ow would one go about properly exploring these regulations without seriously impeding the preeminent concern, the freedom of the press? >> i think by being aware of thats a possible concern. but if you look at -- we talked earlier about the fact that every other walk of life has some sort of oversight and

scrutiny and regulation some of the reports that the broadcasting regulator publishes from time to time would be similar to this. i'm simply suggesting that whichever body replaces the pcc as well as investigating individual complaints against a code -- and as i said in my first statement i think 9 pcc code is a very good basis. but also to look at trends. you took evidence from the mccanns. had there been a regulator who as that story was developing could actually have said we are going to have an investigation into the way this is being covered, that might have had an effect, and i think it would have been an effect for the good. i mentioned some of the specific issues there. the editorial line about the bbc. i'm not saying you can't have a bias. but i think if an outside body were able to analyze whether they felt there were one -- and inevitably there's going to be

some subjectivity attached to this. but when this inquiry finally writes its report, judgments are made. that's what people are put in these positions to do. so i'm suggesting somebody, somebody's put in that position to make judgments so the public's better informed. and i say later that as a result of this inquiry the public have learned and seen things that they didn't know about. i think that's been to the public good already. but if this body were able to say i'm concerned about this issue, i want to -- i'd like to interview an editor or an owner about that, what on earth is wrong with that? i don't see anything wrong with it at all. i think it would be good. good thing for the press. and i make the point that you would probably know more about this than i do but some of the regulation of the legal profession i think has probably strengthened the legal profession and it's been a

mixture of statutory and non-statutory. >> if you compare the last sentence of paragraph 37 with the last sentence of paragraph 39, start with the last sentence of 39. you say, "if, for example, a paper repeatedly distorts the facts in support of a political goal -- stopping the paper from reporting that way, there's value in some respected body pointing out that's what's happening." if the facts were being distorted that would be a breach of clause one of the -- >> i haven't explained that very well. what i mean by that is for example, i talked earlier about the sun has a particular view on europe. or at the moment they have a particular view on ken clark and

his fitness to be secretary of state. so you can take a fact, for example, the eurozone's in crisis. accept that's a fact. but then you can take that fact and you can turn it into a comment that justifies your position on europe. likize if you're ken clark. if a select committee report is published which is critical of the justice department, you can take that and you can splash all over your front page why clark has to go. i'm making the point that the facts will be there in the story somewhere. the distortion is in the way they take them then to build a comment which relates to a campaign they're running. i don't think you should stop newspapers from doing that. it's perfectly legitimate for newspapers to have strong positions. the fact is a fact. but i'm simply saying if you have an outside body that says actually, this paper has a position on europe, has a

position on a particular politician, has a position on a particular political party -- i saw a bit about gus o'donald this morning and he was making a point about the bbc and the "times" and this is particularly relevant to this debate about what's being online. the public are absorbing all this stuff not necessarily knowing what the motivation of an owner is, what the motivation of an editor may be. and i think actually an outside body can help to bring thetrans are never going to shine upon themselves. history would suggest. >> is this what some of the ngos do? is it full fact and the media stands trusted, those sort of bodies get involved in that sort of thing? >> they do. but it's interesting that i mentioned the peter oborne piece in the british journalism review. there are some journalists who do this as well.

but they tend as in that article to be treated as outsiders, oddballs. i think that what hacked off in full fact and the media standards trust and these bodies are representing is a genuine public concern about what the media has become and this loss of face and loss of trust in where fact ends and where comment begins. and i agree with what gus o'donald said this morning but i think it's naive of either of us to think you're ever go to change that and actually a part of me says you shouldn't want to change that. particularly in the internet age newspapers have to be able to take strong positions but you think there should be a greater ability for people or organizations to be able to have a come back against them when they are distorting not just fusing facts and comment but actually rin venting to suit i

particular agenda. and we had that the whole time. and so did a lot of people in public life. >> i'm just trying to think through this, mr. campbell. when segregating fact from comments and fact of course is -- can be scrutinized now, but there are certain types of comments that you feel ought to be scrutinized either because they may be a key to the motivations of the editors. is that right? alternatively the comments themselves are so distorted they are close to being perverse. and then some might sigh almost factually untrue. is that it? >> yeah. and this is a difficult area. i talked in my first witness statement about the whole business of anonymous quotes. to my mind the fact a lot of them are invented. how's a regulator ever going to get to the bottom of that? a journalist says, well somebody

said it to me, and you can't disprove it. that is true. but most people who've had a very high-profile, particularly in the political environment, know because we've all been on the receiving end of stories which we know to be true. untrue. we just talked about one of them in relationship to black rod, where a civil servant was accused of doing something she just never did. and then i of course was accused of having put her up to it. and then tony blair was accused of putting her up to it to put me up to it. based on anonymous quotes. maybe somebody did say something. but it's very difficult when you know what they said sun true. i don't know what a regulator does about that. but i think having a respected outside body that is able to investigate and look at things thematically i think would be a useful addition to this area. now, the other area -- because of course you've got a problem. is that u'