Leveson inquiry: Simon Hughes claims Sun had access to phone records

Lib Dem MP says he was forced to admit homosexuality after tabloid claimed it had evidence he called a gay chatline Simon Hughes told the Leveson inquiry that he outed himself in a 2006 interview with Trevor Kavanagh of the Sun after a journalist from the tabloid had rung him to say the newspaper had his personal telephone call records to show he had called a gay chatline. Hughes added that he believed the forced admission, came at the time he was running for the party leadership and pushed him out of contention. However, he did not name any Sun journalists he spoke to because the inquiry’s solicitor said they may have been “party to an offence under the Data Protection Act” by obtaining his call records. Hughes said that a reporter calling him “told me that the Sun had telephone calls records showing that I had called a gay chatline. Although I thought then, and still believe, that my sexuality is a private matter, I immediately admitted to this.” Obtaining another person’s telephone records is an offence under section 55 of the Data Protection Act 1988. However, there is a public interest defence for journalists under the act. An article appeared in the Sun headlined “Hughes: I’ve had gay sex” in January 2006 and was written by the paper’s then-political editor Kavanagh. At the time Charles Kennedy had just quit as Lib Dem leader and Hughes said he was the bookie’s odds-on favourite to win. Following the Sun story he said he became the 4-1 outsider in a race won by Menzies Campbell. Kavanagh told the Guardian that he was content to be named as the journalist who spoke to the Lib Dem MP. “I am perfectly happy for it to be known that it was me who spoke to Simon Hughes. After all, my byline is on the story. The only reason I got involved at all was because Simon asked for me to interview him after he had been approached by someone else at the paper.” The Sun’s report at the time justified its story by saying that Hughes had “twice denied he was homosexual” – having issued denials to the Independent a week before the Sun’s story and the Pink Paper in 2004. Simon Hughes told the inquiry the meeting with the journalist to discuss the phone call to the chatline “was relatively short, because although it was a hugely important and personally difficult matter, I was in the middle of an election campaign, I had a campaign team who were working for me, and I wanted to mitigate the harmful effects of whatever was happening”. Speaking to the Guardian after he gave evidence, Hughes said he did not know how the Sun had obtained the telephone records but that he believed the paper had no public interest in his sexuality. “It was a character assassination, not backed up by anything,” he added. Kavangah cautiously justified his actions. The Sun’s associate editor said: “If he hadn’t wanted to speak about it, he need not have done. Remember, he asked to see me and spoke about it.” He added: “It could be argued that he had twice denied about being gay. Maybe times have changed. It seemed like a story to me.” Hughes said he did not see the underlying information that the Sun had unearthed: “He never showed me whether it was a BT printout or whatever. I don’t know if someone from BT [or another phone company] woke up one morning and said this is of interest or whether the Sun was pro-active.” Kavanagh indicated that he did not know the source of the Sun’s information about Hughes’s use of a gay chatline. He said: “I don’t know where the original tip for the story came from. I am sure it was not obtained through phone hacking.” • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook . Leveson inquiry Phone hacking Newspapers & magazines National newspapers Newspapers Press intrusion The Sun Liberal Democrats Simon Hughes Lisa O’Carroll Roy Greenslade guardian.co.uk

Posted by Breaking News Online on February 28, 2012. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.