Piers Morgan in TV row with Tory accuser

[dipsydoodle]

Piers Morgan was involved in an extraordinary TV row with a Conservative MP who had accused him of phone-hacking while protected from legal action by parliamentary privilege.

Louise Mensch said the former Britain's Got Talent judge had admitted that he intercepted voicemails when he was editor of the Daily Mirror.

The MP claimed during a Commons select committee hearing that Morgan boasted in his 2005 bestseller based on his diaries that it won him Scoop of the Year for exposing an affair between Sven-Goran Eriksson and Ulrika Jonsson.

Morgan confronted Ms Mensch on CNN last night and demanded she correct what he called "an absolute blatant lie" and "an outrageous attempt to smear my name". He added: "At no stage in my book or indeed outside of my book have I ever boasted of phone hacking for any stories."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23971427-piers-morgan-forced-to-deny-that-he-personally-hacked-phones.do

I wasn't aware the parliamentary privilege extended outside of the House of Commons ?

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. Not only does the privilege still count for the MPs on a select committee

it counts for what witnesses say too.

http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons-committees/witnessguide.pdf (page 10)

"Witnesses to select committees enjoy absolute privilege in respect of the evidence they
give, whether written or oral, provided that it is formally accepted as such by the
Committee. Absolute privilege protects freedom of speech in parliamentary proceedings; it
is enshrined in statutory form in Article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1689, which prohibits
proceedings in Parliament from being called in question in any court. In practical terms
this means that select committee witnesses are immune from civil or criminal proceedings
founded upon that evidence; nor can their evidence be relied upon in civil or criminal
proceedings against any other person.

Absolute privilege does not apply to written submissions which have been distributed or
made available prior to being published by a committee.

The protection which absolute privilege gives to those preparing written evidence and to
witnesses must not be abused. In particular, witnesses should answer questions put to them
by a committee carefully, fully and honestly. Deliberately attempting to mislead a
committee is a contempt of the House, which the House has the power to punish."