Peers vote to restart the Leveson inquiry

Government vows to fight against ‘cynical, undemocratic ploy’ to restrict press freedoms

THE new Culture Secretary vowed to defend press freedom after members of the House of Lords voted effectively to restart the Leveson inquiry into the newspaper industry.

Matt Hancock, appointed in Monday’s reshuffle, said the vote would “undermine high-quality journalism, fail to resolve challenges that the media face and is a hammer blow to local press” after peers voted by 238 to 209 to require the Government to start an official inquiry into “issues arising from data protection breaches commit- ted by or on behalf of news publishers”.

The new inquiry would look “into the extent of unlawful or improper conduct within news publishers” about personal data, as well as “the extent of corporate governance and management failures at news publishers”.

Last night, Michael Gove, a former journalist and now the Environment Secretary, added his condemnation of the Lords’ vote saying: “Matt is absolutely right – free media is vital to democracy and local press should not be fettered in this way.”

Peers said that the Government should now restart the second leg of the Leveson inquiry into the relationship between the media and the police.

The Government will now have to schedule time in the House of Commons to allow MPS to overturn the amendment to the Data Protection Bill. Mr Hancock said: “The House of Lords have just voted to restrict press freedoms… We support a free press and will seek to overturn these amendments in the Commons.”

A source close to Mr Hancock later told The Daily Telegraph that he was “fairly confident” of overturning the amendment because MPS would be alarmed by the negative impact that a new inquiry would have upon local newspapers.

A Government source added: “The Conservative manifesto is clear. We will not proceed with the second stage of the Leveson Inquiry given the lengthy investigations into alleged wrongdoing.

“This is a cynical, undemocratic ploy that would affect every single media outlet in the country.”

The Leveson inquiry was carried out by Sir Brian Leveson, a High Court judge, after it emerged that tabloid journalists had hacked mobile phones.

Public hearings were held in 2011 and 2012, with a final 2,000 page report published in November of that year.

The second part of the inquiry to address the extent of any criminality, evidence of any cover-up and collusion between the press and the police was delayed until after criminal cases into phone hacking were completed.