Outspoken former Sun editor Kelvin MacKenzie has launched an extraordinary attack on David Cameron’s relationship with Rupert Murdoch by describing the prime minister as “arse-kissing” the media mogul.
In a lively day at the Leveson Inquiry, MacKenzie said the whole investigation had been set up to help Cameron divert his poor judgement in hiring former News of the World editor Andy Coulson.
"This is the way in which our prime minister is hopeful he can escape his own personal lack of judgment.
“He knows, and Andy knows, that he should never have been hired into the heart of government. I don't blame Andy for taking the job. I do blame Cameron for offering it."
MacKenzie, now a Daily Mail writer, went on to describe “Cameron's obsessive arse-kissing over the years of Rupert Murdoch".
“Tony Blair was pretty good, and Brown wasn't too bad. But Cameron was the daddy of them all."
"There was always a queue to kiss their rings. It was gut-wrenching. Cameron wanted Rupert onside as he believed, quite wrongly in my view, that the Sun's endorsement would help him to victory."
"The order went out from Cameron: stop the arse-kissing and start the arse-kicking. And the answer is this bloody inquiry chaired by Leveson."
MacKenzie’s remarkably frank assessment of the phone hacking situation followed a punchy defence of the newspaper industry by Daily Mail editor in chief Paul Dacre.
Earlier in the day, Dacre said an industry ombudsman should be established to work with the Press Complaints Committee to prevent scandals such as phone hacking again.
“We are in danger of ignoring the fact that news does not grow on trees. Establishing the truth requires resource and it’s becoming increasingly difficult,” he told the Leveson Inquiry into phone hacking.
Dacre, famed in Fleet Street for his tough editorial stance, believes the ombudsman should have power to investigate potential press scandals, summon journalists to give evidence, and name and shame offending journalists or editors.
His lecture centred on the question of increased regulation of the press – an issue which had him seemingly bubbling with rage.