The publisher of The Sun has agreed to search for documents that could relate to allegations that he invented a “false security threat” to justify the deletion of “millions of incriminating emails”, the High Court was told.
According to court documents, News Group Newspapers (NGN) is accused of creating a “false narrative” that a Labour MP conspired with former Prime Minister Gordon Brown to obtain stolen data in an attempt to cover up wrongdoing and “undermine” the police investigation into the wiretapping scandal.
The claim that emails were deleted en masse is the subject of a lawsuit brought by the Duke of Sussex and others against NGN, alleging that the company was the target of unlawful information gathering.
NGN denies that the 2011 security threat related to the alleged theft of then-CEO Rebekah Brooks’ emails was planned as part of a “cover-up”.
The company, which also published the now-defunct newspaper The Sun, had previously denied that any illegal activities had taken place at The Sun.
On Monday, a judge was told that the publisher had agreed to search for potentially relevant material linked to Will Lewis, a former chief executive of News International and current publisher of The Washington Post, as well as James Murdoch, the son of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, and others.
This happened at a preliminary hearing in London on allegations made by former Labour deputy leader Lord Tom Watson and former Liberal Democrat business secretary Sir Vince Cable.
Both former ministers who attended the hearing claim NGN was targeted through the interception of voicemails and the use of private investigators.
Former MP Sir Vince’s lawsuit accuses the publisher of illegally obtaining secret recordings of his 2010 constituency speech in which he said he had “declared war on Murdoch”.
According to the documents, Sir Vince claims that the recordings, which he obtained as part of a “sting operation” by the Daily Telegraph, were leaked to the BBC by Mr Lewis.
The BBC’s report of these comments prompted former Prime Minister David Cameron to relieve Sir Vince of responsibility for deciding on NGN’s parent company News Corp.’s bid to take over the broadcaster BSkyB.
Counsel for Lord Watson and Sir Vince asked Judge Fancourt to instruct NGN to conduct further searches for material that might reveal evidence relevant to their cases.
NGN rejected some of the offers for disclosure research on the grounds that it would be a “disproportionate” and “expensive and time-consuming” process, but agreed to some research.
David Sherborne, representing Lord Watson and Sir Vince, said in a written statement that the former had been the target of unlawful activity due to his role on the Parliamentary Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport, which was investigating “media abuse”.
The lawyer said Lord Watson was “falsely cited by senior NGN executives such as Rebekah Brooks and Will Lewis as part of a ‘fake security threat’ used to ‘justify’ the deletion of crucial backup tapes of NGN’s email system, resulting in the destruction of millions of incriminating emails”.
He said NGN should search for material related to an allegation that “Rebekah Brooks’ emails were allegedly stolen, offered or made available to the plaintiff, he handled stolen data and colluded with Gordon Brown to obtain that data”.
“This was then used as a front to destroy emails on a large scale,” Sherborne said.
The lawyer said Sir Vince claimed NGN targeted him and his government colleagues during News Corp’s bid for BSkyB shares with the intent of unlawful intelligence gathering.
“News Corp was keen to avoid any intervention from the government or official regulator,” Sherborne said.
According to Sir Vince’s written claims, NGN unlawfully obtained recordings of his “private conversations” through Mr Lewis through “improper payments or inducements” to an employee of the Daily Telegraph’s IT department “and/or through other unlawful means”.
When he gave evidence to the Leveson Inquiry in 2012, Lewis declined to answer whether he had passed on Sir Vince’s comments to former BBC journalist Robert Peston, citing the need to protect his sources.
Anthony Hudson KC of NGN said there had already been “extensive” revelations in the court proceedings.
The lawyer said some more extensive searches for material had been “disproportionate” given that the value of Sir Vince and Lord Watson’s claims was less than £100,000 and the two men incurred even higher legal costs in their attempts to obtain disclosure.
In written arguments, Mr Hudson said the “threat” to Ms Brooks’ data was believed to be “serious”.
He added: “NGN received information on two occasions that there was a direct threat that a current or former employee was actively attempting to sell data belonging to NGN.
“With this in mind, NGN has decided that confidential data should not be stored multiple times in different systems as this would increase the risk of data loss.”
Judge Fancourt made judgments on certain disclosure offers.
The hearing is due to continue on Tuesday to consider Sir Vince’s remaining applications, including the issue of secret recordings.
