Adrian Sanders questions timing of Rebekah Brooks arrest

By PRSD, on Monday, July 18, 2011

Torbay MP Adrian Sanders: member of the the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee

Torbay MP Adrian Sanders, who’s on the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, has questioned the timing of former New of the World editor Rebekah Brooks in the phone hacking scandal.

Rebekah was due to appear before the select committee on Tuesday.

He told the BBC: “In whose interest was it for this arrest to take place before Tuesday? Because if it does impede what we can ask, that’s not going to go down well with my fellow committee members.

“Quite why now, just a few hours before our select committee meets, an arrangement has been made for an arrest. A lot of people are going to think this is very, very odd.

“If this is designed to take the spotlight off the police at the same time giving a shield to Rebekah Brooks, that’s a very serious matter indeed. We don’t know how much this is going to impede our questioning until we’ve been able to sit down and talk it through with the parliamentary counsel.”

The select committee was disappointed with News International’s responses to earlier inquiries, the conclusion of the committee included:

Throughout we have repeatedly encountered an unwillingness to provide the detailed information that we sought, claims of ignorance or lack of recall, and deliberate obfuscation.

We strongly condemn this behaviour which reinforces the widely held impression that the press generally regard themselves as unaccountable and that News International in particular has sought to conceal the truth about what really occurred.

Read what Adrian Sanders said last year on the News of the World, and the Culture Media and Sport Select Committee’s investigation into phone hacking