Why Cameron discussing BSkyB with Brooks would matter

Yesterday, David Cameron repeatedly refused to answer whether he discussed the BSkyB bid with Rebekah Brooks on any of the multiple occasions he met with her since becoming Prime Minister. Instead he has relied on a rather precise formulation of words where he claims he had "no inappropriate conversations" with her and he also points out that he had been taken entirely out of the BSkyB bid process.

It is true that the ultimate decision lay with Jeremy Hunt the Culture Secretary and that he is supposed to be following a quasi-judicial process.

But it still matters if (and I repeat if) Cameron did discuss the BSkyB bid with one of News International's most senior executives. The fact that the relationship between the Prime Minister and Brooks (and also Andy Coulson) was so close provided almost deafening mood music as a backdrop to the bid. Hunt would have to have a particularly tin ear not to have picked up on it. And of course Hunt is relying on Cameron for future promotion and preferment. I am not saying there is anything provable about how one may influence the other, there almost definitely will not be. The main protagonists may not be consciously aware of it even if there was; it could happen on a subconscious level. They are only human beings.

So Cameron should never have discussed the BSkyB bid with Brooks. At all. If she had started to go near it he should have cut her short and insisted it would be wrong to discuss it. If he had done this though I imagine he would have had no problem saying so in the Commons.

Cameron's attempt to draw a line under the affair yesterday with his statement to the House and the questioning he faced afterwards appears to have been partially successful. For the first time in two weeks the "hackgate" saga is not leading the bulletins. But his refusal to answer this properly yesterday has opened up more questions about precisely how close the relationship was and casts further doubt on his judgement.

After all, why would a Prime Minister put himself in a position where he is having to use terminological contortions to obfuscate on this question when he should just be able to say unequivocally that he never discussed the bid?

What will David Cameron do about Andy Coulson now?

I was going to do a more detailed post on the Andy Coulson/bullying case but Anthony Painter has pretty much said what I was going to here.

All I would add to what Anthony has said is that tribunals don't usually give out £800,000 for nothing and David Cameron needs to think very carefully about the message that his potential action (or inaction) about Mr Coulson regarding this could send out.

Andy Coulson survives - for now

So it it starting to look like my prediction from Thursday morning that Andy Coulson would have to go and soon will not come to pass following the "Hackgate" scandal breaking.

I think I underestimated two things:

• David Cameron's determination to hold onto his communications chief.
• The determination of (much of) the press to close ranks (even much of the non-Murdoch press) and dampen this story down.

Apart from The Guardian and The Independent yesterday I struggled to find much coverage in any of the other press. Unsurprisingly The Sun and The Times were quiet on it but much of the other press was too. As Michael Portillo said on This Week on Thursday "Dog does not eat dog". Unless there are more revelations on Sunday then it is now clear that Coulson will survive the weekend.

There are numerous other traps though lying in wait. The first one is at the hastily convened Select Committee hearing on this subject on Tuesday. He needs to do well and be convincing at that. The second is the possibility that one or more of the people who have had their phones allegedly hacked pursue private prosecutions against the NOTW/Murdoch. This would drag the whole thing through court with Mr Coulson doubtless called to give evidence and would provide new fuel on the fire of this story. However that could be a long way off.

Another possibility is that Cameron quietly lines up a replacement in the coming weeks or months and Coulson then appears to go at a time of his own choosing before the General Election. My money is on this as as good as Mr Coulson is, the risk of this story reigniting and also the taint of what has been alleged on a large scale whilst he was the editor of NOTW could be very damaging, especially if new allegations or evidence came out close to or during an election campaign.

So he survives in post for now but I think his longer term prospects have taken a severe blow. Should the Tories win the next election, perhaps now Mr Coulson now won't get the chance to be to Prime Minister Cameron what Alistair Campbell was to Prime Minister Blair.

Andy Coulson will go - and soon

Following yesterday's revelations about the Murdoch owned papers apparently having paid £1m to silence victims of phone-tapping (the Guardian splashes on it today) the former News of the World editor Andy Coulson is now under extreme pressure. He used to be editor of the NOTW but resigned in 2007 over the royal phone-tapping scandal involving Clive Goodman and is now head of communications for the Conservative Party.

I read Flat Earth News last year, a book by journalist Nick Davies that exposes the methods used by Fleet Street including in Chapter 7 "The Dark Arts" a detailed description of how, according to Mr Davies newspapers regularly use Private Investigators to source information for stories and that the PI's sometimes use unethical methods to get it. Phone-tapping is mentioned as one of these methods amongst many others and yesterday's revelations don't come as a huge surprise to me.

The focus now seems to be on Mr Coulson's position within the Conservative Party. He was editor of the NOTW at the time when some of the alleged actions took place and as Andrew Neil said on Newsnight last night "it beggars belief" that he was not aware of what was going on. It seems to me that must be right. Either he knew what was happening, or he had lots of out of control journalists working for him who pulled the wool over his eyes. I can't imagine that someone who could be duped so easily could run communications for a large political party.

If Mr Cameron is smart (and we all know he is) he will be lining up a potential replacement as I write. He may claim to be "relaxed" about the situation but not so relaxed as to not have a Plan B I am sure. Cameron will not want the taint of this story to start damaging the Conservative Party; that is what will start to happen if he doesn't do something quickly. We know David Cameron can be ruthless when it comes to the crunch (a putative Prime Minister has to be sometimes) and this situation feels very crunchy indeed.

I expect Mr Coulson to be out by the weekend.

UPDATE 1: I just wanted to make clear that the Guardian journalist with the splash on this today is also Nick Davies the author of Flat Earth News mentioned elsewhere in my post.

UPDATE 2: My blog post here has very kindly been included and linked to by The Guardian in its coverage of blog reaction to the story.