MPs pressured to hold back on hacking investigation, book claims

News of the World journalists "raked over" the private lives of MPs investigating alleged phone hacking and put one of its most vocal members, Tom Watson, under surveillance, a new book on the hacking scandal has claimed.

Dial M for Murdoch, which was published yesterday by Watson and Independent journalist Martin Hickman, describes the alleged pressure placed on the culture, media and sport select committee and its members by News International to back away from the hacking investigation.

The book claims that the News of the World "established a team" of reporters who "searched for any secret lovers or extra-marital affairs that could be used as leverage against the MPs" - and that "the MPs had no knowledge of what NI was doing behind their backs".

It also claims that News International hired surveillance expert Derek Webb to "follow the every move of Tom Watson" in September 2009.

In an extract published by the Independent today, former News of the World chief reporter Neville Thurlbeck tells the authors: "All I know is that, when the DCMS [Department of Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee] was formed or rather when it got onto all the hacking stuff, there was an edict came down from the editor and it was find out every single thing you can about every single member: who was gay, who had affairs, anything we can use.

"Each reporter was given two members and there were six reporters that went on for around 10 days. I don't know who looked at you. It fell by the wayside; I think even Ian Edmondson [the news editor] realised there was something quite horrible about doing this."

Watson said he was also privately told by Downing Street insiders that News Interational was using its connections to persuade senior politicians to urge him to hold back.

Former Downing Street communications chief Alastair Campbell is quoted saying: "I recall Rebekah Wade telling me that so far as she was concerned, with Tom Watson it's personal, and we won't stop till we get him."

Former Plaid Cymru MP Adam Price said: "I was told by a senior Conservative member of the committee, who I knew was in direct contact with executives at News International, that if we went for her [Rebekah Brooks], they would go for us - effectively they would delve into our personal lives in order to punish [us]."

The book also reveals the extent to which motor racing chief Max Mosley was involved in the civil legal claims brought by some of the alleged victims of phone hacking.

The book says Mosley "agreed to underwrite the risk for several claimants, in both the emerging civil privacy cases against the News of the World and in the judicial review against Scotland Yard ... If the cases were lost, his costs could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds, but Mosley was a multi-millionaire."

Dial M for Murdoch: News Corporation and the Corruption of Britain is published by Allen Lane.

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