Sir Paul Stephenson, former Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, John Yates former Assistant Commissioner, and Dick Fedorcio, director of Public Affairs and Internal Communication for the Met, appeared before the Home Affairs Committee on Tuesday morning.
Much of the questioning revolved around the hiring of Neil Wallis to provide PR services for the Met. Wallis was arrested over phone hacking on July 14th. Fedorcio and Yates both blamed each other for the decision to hire Wallis.
Sir Paul Stephenson, who resigned as Metropolitan Police commissioner over the police’s links with News International, told MPs that 10 of the 45 members of Scotland Yard’s directorate of public affairs (DPA) had previously worked for News International.
“I understand that there are 10 members of the DPA staff who have worked in News International in the past, in some cases journalists, in some cases undertaking work experience with the organisation,” he said.
Stephenson came under pressure after it was revealed that he had accepted a free stay worth £12,000 at a Champneys health spa in January 2011. At the time, the spa employed former News of the World executive editor Neil Wallis for PR work.
Wallis’s own company, Chamy Media, was directly contracted by the Metropolitan Police to “provide strategic communication advice and support” between October 2009 until September 2010.
Speaking of the police’s contract with Chamy Media, Stephenson told MPs: “I am quite happy to say, knowing what we know now, that I regret that contract [with Wallis] because it’s embarrassing. I was consulted in the procurement process but I didn’t hire him. I knew nothing to his detriment.”
The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) announced on Tuesday morning that it was to investigate the relationship between Neil Wallis and the Met’s director of public affairs, Dick Fedorcio, focusing on the circumstances under which the contract for senior level media advice and support was awarded to Chamy Media.
Deputy Chair and Commissioner for London Deborah Glass said: “This is the fifth referral the IPCC has received in 24 hours in relation to senior officers and staff from the Metropolitan Police Service.
“Although some of these cases might not, in other circumstances, meet the criteria for an independent investigation, I have taken the view that in light of the huge public interest and the obvious implications for public confidence in the Metropolitan Police, it would not be appropriate for the police themselves to investigate them. We will therefore use our own investigators to look into any allegations of serious misconduct.
“I am mindful of the other inquiries, and in particular the public inquiry which will, among other things, examine the relationship between police and the media.”
Fedorcio told the House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee that he had trusted Assistant Commissioner John Yates, who advised him it was okay to hire Wallis.
He said he asked Yates about Wallis, who gave him a categorical assurance that there was nothing about phone hacking that could be embarrassing.
“As far as he [Yates] was concerned, having spoken to Mr Wallis, there was nothing that could embarrass us,” Fedorcio said.
Yates told MPs that he had nothing to do with the hiring of Wallis’s firm by the Met.
“I sought assurances off Mr Wallis before the contract was let to the effect ... is there anything in the matters that [the Guardian’s] Nick Davies is still chasing and still reporting on that could at any stage embarrass you, Mr Wallis, me, the Commissioner, or the Metropolitan Police?” he said.
“I received categorical assurances that was the case. That’s not due diligence – due diligence is in the proper letting of a contract.
“I had absolutely nothing to do with that, I had nothing to do with the tendering process, that was a matter for Mr Fedorcio.”
Neil Wallis is understood to be a friend of Yates, who resigned on Monday shortly before the IPCC launched an investigation into Yates’s role in helping Wallis’s daughter get a job at Scotland Yard and his role in the phone hacking scandal.
Yates told MPs: “I’ve done nothing wrong; I was a postbox for a CV from Mr Wallis’s daughter where I made some notes in an e-mail, which gives a completely equivocal interest in whether she gets employment or not.
“I passed on that e-mail and the CV to the director of human resources in the Met, thereafter I don’t know what’s happened to it.”
Stephenson denied that the prime minister had urged him to resign.
“Contrary to much ill-informed media speculation, I’m not leaving because I was pushed, or threatened, I’m not leaving because I have anything to fear, I’m not leaving because of any lack of support from the mayor, the prime minister or the home secretary,” he said in a statement.
“Up until the point of informing them of my resignation, their support was very strong and afterwards their comments most generous.”
The Metropolitan Police also released a statement denying Mr Cameron’s involvement in Stevenson’s resignation: “There was never any discussion with No 10 about Neil Wallis. What the Commissioner said is that he would never wish to inadvertently place the prime minister in a position where anyone could accuse him of being compromised by providing operational information about anyone in the investigation.”
[The involvement of Neil Wallis in the phone hacking scandal has serious implications for the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), whose role is currently being reviewed by judge Lord Justice Leveson’s inquiry into phone hacking. Neil Wallis is a former member of the PCC’s Editors’s Code of Practice. The self-regulatory PCC may be replaced by a watchdog that is completely independent of the press.]
