Fishburn Hedges

06.07.2011

James Murdoch – or even Rupert – the number for our Emergency Relations offer is on the website. You might need some help at the moment.

The phone hacking scandal, which had already harmed the credibility of News International, has moved into an extremely dangerous stage following the revelations that the News of The World hacked the accounts of murder victim Milly Dowler as well as victims of the Soham murders and the 7/7 terrorist attacks.

MPs, advertisers, media commentators and just about anyone who could get near a microphone have condemned the actions. The scandal is costing News International money as well as credibility and threatens the planned takeover of BSkyB.

So, how are the Murdochs handling it? I’d argue they are not following what might be called best practice in crisis communications.

1: News International has chosen to field Simon Greenberg, its communications chief, in TV interviews rather than Rebekah Brooks, its chief executive and the former editor of both the News of The World and The Sun. Simon is an experienced operator – he used to be the PR man for Chelsea FC. But he doesn’t have the authority to kill the story, or the facts at his fingertips to answer some of the trickier questions.

2: The news organisation doesn’t seem to be in control of the flow of information from within it. Someone internally is leaking information to other media – notably The Guardian and the BBC. One of the first things you have to do in a crisis is to lock down information internally and route through one channel. This isn’t happening.

3: Some of the arguments used by News International have not been fully thought through. For example: the excuse that Rebekah Brooks was on holiday when Millie Dowler’s phone was hacked just won’t wash – this was 2002, not 1902.

The communications exercise being run by News International appears to have three objectives – to take the heat out of the story, to save Rebekah Brooks’ job and to save the BSkyB takeover. It may be impossible to achieve all three. At the moment achieving even one looks a challenge.

Posted by Jason Nisse