Public Confidence in the Media and Police

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, who has carried out excellent work on this, for that comment. My point is that Mr Yates did not need even eight hours. He needed eight minutes, because all he had to consider was the central fact that the latest information in The Guardian revealed that there was not one rogue reporter, but more than one. Paul Stephenson, in his resignation statement, made a distinction between his appointment of Mr Wallis and the Prime Minister's appointment of Mr Coulson. A distinction has repeatedly been made in the House by the Home Secretary and others, who have tried to say that an important line has to be drawn between the investigated and the investigator. I agree: that is absolutely right, but it is equally right and it is of fundamental importance in our debate about public confidence in the media and the police that we should consider public confidence in the Government and in the Prime Minister. If there is a proper line between the investigator and the investigated, there should be a proper line between the law maker and the law breaker.