James Murdoch recalled by parliament

The Culture, Media and Sport committee has recalled James Murdoch to give further evidence into phone hacking and James Murdoch’s people are briefing journalists that he is happy to appear.

Sophy Ridge reports that the committee had a long discussion about who to recall, but were largely in agreement and there was no vote. In truth, their decision was virtually inevitable after Tom Crone said he was certain that he and Colin Myler had spoken to Murdoch about the ‘For Neville’ email, which suggested that hacking was widespread. Myler has corroborated Crone’s claims. 

Committee chairman John Whittingdale has said that Murdoch will be asked to clarify this and other questions. Those other questions probably relate to Clive Goodman’s allegations that senior executives had knowledge of phone hacking long before they have so far admitted, and Harbottle and Lewis’ insistence that elements of Murdoch’s original evidence were “hard to credit”. These issues emerged when the committee released