Hiss and tell: Was Rupert Murdoch’s hatred of the BBC behind The Sun’s Huw Edwards exposé?

In 2009, a married footballer, known only to the outside world as MJN, had an affair with a lingerie model. The model, in time-honoured fashion (these were the days of lucrative kiss and tell), went to The Sun newspaper with the story: “MY FLING WITH PREM STAR”.

The paper wanted to go further and name the love rat in question – only to be foiled by MJN obtaining an injunction. Cue much fury from the newspaper, which protested loudly at being GAGGED.

The rules over the boundary lines between private and public had been painstakingly negotiated between Fleet Street executives and the Blair government at the time the Human Rights Act came into force a decade earlier – and required courts to take account of any relevant journalistic codes of practice.

So, in 2009, The Sun knew that in order to reverse the injunction, they would have to demonstrate the public interest in the world knowing about MJN’s fling with the lingerie model. That’s what the relevant code of practice said.

And that’s, indeed, what the paper protested in public. But when it came to the hearing to challenge the injunction, their lawyers evidently felt they couldn’t make such an argument with a straight face. And so they didn’t – indeed, the paper didn’t even show up in court.

There were several such high-profile cases around that time, with newspapers complaining about “judge-made” privacy law at the same time as publishing hugely intrusive stories with no pretence of genuine public interest. The judges had little option then (though it’s certainly arguable that the concept of privacy has gone too far now).

During the Leveson Inquiry into other forms of (criminal) press intrusion, it emerged that two senior (married) Murdoch tabloid executives – I won’t name them, though it was a matter of public record at the time – had been having a lengthy affair, while routinely exposing other people in public life for doing exactly the same. It was, literally, one rule for them and another rule for anyone else.

There’s been little self-reflection by journalists as to the role a tiny handful of newspapers played in hastening the development of a law that hit at the heart of their own business model, as well as affecting the media more widely.

Fast forward 14 years and what’s changed? It was striking that The Sun last week chose not to name the BBC presenter caught up in online sex allegations. It was less, “We name the Guilty Man” than, “Would someone else mind naming him instead?” They must have anticipated that – if not the BBC itself – social media would do the rest.

But the BBC didn’t fall into the trap. The suspicion must be that both The Sun and the BBC were receiving the same legal advice: that absent of any hard evidence of any criminal behaviour, the presenter might well argue that what he did in his private life was just that – private.

During the five days before Huw Edwards was named by his wife, Vicky Flind – and before the police announced that there was, indeed, no evidence of criminal behaviour – the lines between private and public continued to be blurred, and not just by The Sun.

The BBC’s 10pm news bulletin on Tuesday night led with a story, unearthed by its own journalists, to the effect that their colleague had (perfectly legally) used a dating app. According to the report, Edwards had (perfectly legally) made connection with someone – let’s call them NJM – in their twenties. They never met. At one point, NJM threatened to make the online contacts public. Edwards responded angrily.

Was it right to out a (married) colleague for using a dating app and to reveal the nature and tone of text messages? Or was that behaviour, if anything, an HR issue – more properly dealt with through internal channels?

Nothing is simple about this case. Huw Edwards is one of the most famous faces in the UK and it was arguably reckless, at the least, to have behaved as he is alleged to have behaved. We don’t know exactly what went on between Edwards and the teenager in the original story (they have denied it in general terms) but there is certainly a public interest, post-Savile, in how the corporation handles such complaints.

And society is only just beginning to work out where the boundaries of privacy lie in the digital space. Does, for instance, a gay person using the LGBT+ Grindr dating app have a reasonable expectation of privacy? Or should it be regarded as a kind of public square? Are there different rules for the famous and the non-famous?

By last night, The Sun was claiming it had never suggested any kind of criminality, blaming other papers for “reading too much into its reporting”. But on Tuesday, it ran a prominent story headlined: “Top BBC star could be charged by cops and face years in jail”. A case of cakeism.

At the end of this saga, distressing for all, there are questions for both the BBC and The Sun. The BBC will be asking itself whether it made enough effort to investigate an apparent complaint in May; whether it should have been “red-flagged” sooner – and whether Edwards himself should have been alerted to the complaint. They should also reflect on the corporation’s ability to turn every BBC drama into a disproportionate crisis. Thirteen minutes at the top of the main news bulletin of the day on Tuesday? Really?

There are questions for The Sun, too – but, honestly, why bother? In contrast to the BBC’s commendable (if over the top) openness over the past week, not a single Sun executive or journalist has been prepared to talk about the story.

People can complain all they like about The Sun’s internal processes and journalism, but the paper will never engage (though it will often savage anyone with the temerity to criticise it). So, it’s an asymmetric war between two organisations with very different ideas of governance, transparency – or what is even meant by the word “journalism”.

Rupert Murdoch and his sons have, publicly and privately, lobbied and argued against the BBC for years. The intensity of their loathing of the organisation has not cooled – if Boris Johnson’s sister, Rachel, is to be believed. In November 2021, she told an industry event that Murdoch had demanded of the then prime minister: “Boris, you’ve got to get rid of the BBC. It’s eating my lunch, they got a website, they’re a publisher, it’s not competitive.”

Was this proprietorial ambition to “get rid of” the BBC a factor in The Sun’s story? Stout denials all round. In truth, we’ll never know – just as The Sun is silent on the hundreds of millions it’s currently forking out to alleged victims of phone hacking without admitting liability (£100m in damages and legal fees in 2022 alone).

Imagine the terminal consequences for the BBC if alleged criminality on that scale had been uncovered at the corporation – and if the BBC refused to cover it.

For the moment, Huw Edwards is lying in a hospital bed – and his family are asking for privacy for “everyone caught up in these upsetting events”. Let’s hope they get it.

Alan Rusbridger, a former editor-in-chief of The Guardian, is editor of Prospect Magazine