Mail and News International putting Brown under pressure

The government has been put under pressure to drop certain clauses from Criminal Justice & Immigration Bill relating to the buying of personal data


Iain Dale follows up a story in this morning's Guardian which suggests that the might of Paul Dacre and Rupert Murdoch are putting pressure on Gordon Brown

Gordon Brown has demanded the scrapping of longstanding plans for a clampdown on newspapers that illegally buy personal data, such as health, bank and telephone records, the Guardian has learned. This has provoked criticism that he has bowed to pressure from the media.

Iain points out that

About eighteen months ago it was revealed how many times different national newspapers had effectively stolen people's personal data, using middle men to do it. Three hundred journalists had used agencies to uncover details illegally, most of them from the Mail Group and News International.

and claims

News International, owned by Rupert Murdoch, and the Mail Group have been lobbying the government hard to remove Clause 76 from the Bill.

But according to Iain tomorrow the Information commissioner will

issue a stark call to politicians to resist attempts to water down new penalties for deliberate breaches of people’s health, financial and other personal details.