‘This is the most humble day of my career’: 5 key moments from Murdoch’s first hour of testimony

Posted By Robert Zeliger Tuesday, July 19, 2011 - 10:39 AM Share

The room where the Murdochs are currently testifying looks more like a place you'd hold a school board meeting rather than a parliamentary committee hearing.  

Murdoch is very low energy and seems to not have a firm grasp of all the information being discussed. He takes long pauses before answering questions. As far as visuals go, Murdoch has had his head slumped down at times when he is not testifying -- looking as tired as he has said he feels.

According to the Guardian, the News Corp. strategy that seems to be emerging is to have James "talk as much as possible and keep the interventions of Rupert Murdoch to a minimum. The role of James Murdoch is to ‘translate' his father's curt responses into comprehensive replies."

But for the most part committee members have directed their questions to the senior Murdoch and not his son, who has been eager to answer. In fact, Rupert frequently has looked toward James, saying it's more appropriate that he answers.

But, on more than one occasion, MPs have said, "If we can just return to your father..."

A few key statements Rupert Murdoch has made so far:

On the reason he decided to shut down the News of the World:

"We had broken our trust with our readers."

Was it a "commercial" decision to shut down the paper?

"Far from [it]."

Is he [Rupert] responsible for "this whole fiasco?"

"No."

When asked who is, he replied:

"The people I trusted to run it and maybe the people they trusted. I worked with Mr. Hinton [Les Hinton, the former News International exec and Dow Jones chief who resigned last week] for 52 years and I would trust him with my life."

Did this scandal cross the ocean to the United States?

"I cannot believe it happened by anyone in America."

A moment of levity: One MP asked why the prime minister had Murdoch come in to 10 Downing Street through the back door, since even world leaders enter through the front.

"I was asked, I just did what I was told."

Murdoch said he was also asked to go through the back door by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The audience laughed.

 

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ADDIE GUADELOUPE

9:12 PM ET

August 15, 2011

‘This is the most humble day of my career’

Rupert Murdoch has revealed the full extent of his ignorance of the phone-hacking scandal at his UK newspaper empire that led to the closure of the News of the World. In a hesitant performance in front of MPs on Tuesday. punctuated by long pauses before many of his answers, the News Corporation chairman and chief executive bree olson said it was "the most humble day of my life". He appeared to have little knowledge of key events and figures who played a prominent part in events that have consumed his company. Murdoch also shed further light on the nature of his relationship with David Cameron, saying that he had been invited to No 10 but had been told by the prime minister's staff to go in by the back door. However, when pressed by an MP, Murdoch said his company would cease contributing to the legal costs of Glenn Mulcaire, the private investigator formerly paid by the News of the World to hack into people's mobile phone voicemail messages, subject to contractual obligations.

 

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