While Rupert Murdoch’s media empire remains as mired in the mud of the phone hacking scandal as ever, Britain’s top politicians are being sucked in as well. Responding to criticism that the new Conservative government of David Cameron has been too cozy with Murdoch’s newspapers, the Prime Minister’s aides recently released a diary of his meetings with News Corp. executives and editors. They reveal that since May 2010, the Prime Minister met 26 times with Rupert Murdoch, his son James Murdoch, or former News International head Rebekah Brooks. That’s nearly once every two weeks. Or as the Times put it: “His meetings with the Murdoch officials exceeded all his encounters with other British media representatives put together.” It now waits to be seen if David Cameron’s calls for a full-scale inquiry into News Corp. will be enough to assuage angry British voters, only 23 percent of whom think Cameron has handled the phone hacking scandal well.
Rupert Murdoch & Co. met with UK Prime Minister David Cameron 26 times in one year [NYDN]
Phone-Hacking Inquiry’s Tentacles Reach Out to Cameron [NYT]
