Rupert Murdoch dominated British politics. He may be the last of his kind.

LONDON – One of the most powerful people in British politics is leaving a media vacuum.

Newspaper and television magnate Rupert Murdoch struck fear and awe into the hearts of London’s political leaders from the 1970s onwards. But his departure as chairman of News Corporation (which owns the Times and Sun newspapers, as well as Times Radio and TalkTV in the UK) could fundamentally change the relationship between politics and the press.

Some argue that Murdoch was an exceptional character, who will never be seen again in a different media landscape. “If Murdoch were starting over now, I just don’t think he would achieve the influence he was able to build then,” said Peter Mandelson, a former cabinet minister who was instrumental in the New Labor project that courted the Australian.

Others argue that the change in leadership could bring about major changes in a media-obsessed Westminster. “When there’s a handover, that’s often the time things reset,” said Craig Oliver, who headed communications at 10 Downing Street for David Cameron. Delivery, announced on Thursdaywill see Murdoch’s son Lachlan take on his father’s role at global brands News Corporation and Fox Corporation, although Murdoch will remain in the background as “chairman emeritus” of the business.

Others expect more of the same under Lachlan. “Congratulations to Rupert Murdoch for achieving a seamless transition within the family’s global media empire, something no UK political leader has ever achieved in the No 10 position,” joked Tom Watson, a former Labor vice-president who fought with Murdoch amid of a sensational hacking scandal. of private voice messages. Watson added: “He’s the son who won.”

That is a reference to the infamous Headline “The sun did not win it”appeared on the front page of the Sun after Labor leader Neil Kinnock, who failed to win the backing of the top-selling tabloid, lost the 1992 general election.

Whether the Sun and other Murdoch titles ever really had, or still have, such influence on British politics is a matter of debate, but there is no doubt that the owner acted accordingly. Murdoch bounced in and out of tenth place over the decades, rubbing shoulders with prime ministers and trying to pull the strings in British politics.

‘Don’t bother Rupert’

After that 1992 defeat, the New Labor project wanted to avoid becoming again the target of the right-wing press that was Kinnock. Tony Blair and his adviser Alastair Campbell were desperate to court Murdoch, as was Chancellor Gordon Brown, who would succeed Blair as prime minister.

“There was a pretty strong maxim in the government which was ‘don’t bother Rupert,’” Mandelson said. “Annoying Rupert was definitely a no-go area.”

Mandelson recalled a night when Brown, as prime minister, was dealing with a cabinet reshuffle. He rang the Downing Street phone and heard Brown refer to his caller as James. Mandelson assumed he was James Murdoch, another of Murdoch’s sons, although it turned out to be cabinet minister James Purnell, who called to inform Brown that he was resigning. Mandelson said that assumption illustrated “how much more important in our minds was the likelihood that the Murdoch press would abandon us.”

Oliver said Cameron had a “tense” relationship with Murdoch, who thought the then Conservative leader, who went on to become prime minister, was too much of a member of the Liberal establishment. He also hated Cameron’s anti-Brexit stance.

But Murdoch was a staunch conservative, so he would back the conservatives by default whenever possible, particularly when they were on track to win. His newspapers would be clear in covering his interests and would talk about plans he didn’t like.

“They managed to really control British journalism and changed it profoundly, so it became a much more binary and aggressive campaign,” Oliver said. “It was certainly clear that they understood their power and were prepared to use it if they felt there was something that needed or needed to change.”

Former Murdoch newsroom employees tell how the boss would fly in before the election and sit in on the Sun’s morning press conferences, “not saying anything”. Come election night, their “legendary” parties at the top would keep some executives detained after the exit polls, if the result went the right way.

“There was definitely a feeling that everyone was more focused with him around,” one joked. who spoke anonymously to speak freely about their workplace. “You definitely knew when he was in London and that he would be vetting what we were writing,” another said, although the person added that they were never told the boss wanted specific stories.

“Contrary to what many people believe, he never interfered,” John Witherow, former editor of the Times and Sunday Times, told Times Radio on Friday. “He never told us what to do. We decided what to do because he trusted us and we had to do what the readers wanted, essentially. He knew that newspapers had to serve readers and he knew that he could not interfere in those matters. In fact, he didn’t want it. He just let us move on.”

‘Poisonous’

Others say that Murdoch’s newsrooms had a network of informants who gathered information and passed it on to the boss, something that weakened after The phone hacking scandal.

Politicians who did not win Murdoch’s approval soon learned this. Oliver recalled seeing then Labor leader Ed Miliband looking for a chance to chat with Murdoch at one of the journalist’s parties in the luxurious garden of the Orangery restaurant, next to Kensington Palace. By then the phone hacking scandal was in full swing, and days later Miliband was in the House of Commons attacking Murdoch. The Sun ridiculed the Labor leader, particularly for a unedifying shot of him eating a bacon sandwich.

Jeremy Corbyn, who succeeded Miliband as Labor leader, never bothered to court Murdoch, although he did deal with his journalists. The far-left Corbyn project saw itself as antithetical to Murdoch’s interests.

Matt Zarb-Cousin, who served as Corbyn’s press secretary, claimed a Sun hacker laughed in his face when he argued that taking energy companies into public ownership would reduce household bills. “It is a newspaper that campaigns for vested interests and cannot be treated in good faith,” Zarb-Cousin said.

James Schneider, who also led Corbyn’s communications, said Murdoch had been “a deeply poisonous influence on British public life, adding: “A free media is necessary for a free society. But we don’t have one.”

Corbyn’s shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, added: “Murdoch dragged journalism and politics into the gutter where truth and basic journalistic standards became irrelevant. He degraded the quality of political discourse in this country.”

The end of an era?

The good news for the left is that many in Westminster believe the era of powerful press barons is over, with the explosion of new media and social networks.

“Murdoch was a huge political force, there is no doubt about that. But the influence of the mainstream media and newspapers in particular is weakening,” Mandelson said. “There are now many more news sources, unfortunately not necessarily more reliable, and public trust in most of them has fallen.”

“I think we are no longer press barons: individuals who use the power of the media to impose the law in politics,” Mandelson added. “People do not accept that powerful individuals dominate the electorate as Murdoch and others did.”

But the right-wing press in Britain still has influence and does everything it can to wield it against people and policies it doesn’t like.

Indeed, Labor leader Keir Starmer, who hoped to unseat the Conservatives in next year’s general election, sought a face-to-face meeting with Murdoch at the summer party the media boss hosted in London in June. And the last time Murdoch was in town he had private meetings with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Home Secretary Suella Braverman and Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch.

Even if the media landscape is changing, British politicians will already be scrambling to determine where Lachlan stands, unsure whether he will want to exert the same level of influence in the UK or even have the same level of interest in politics as his powerbroker. father. Some believe little will change as long as Murdoch Sr. remains in the background.

Whether the new era of weakened media barons and the rise of social media is better than the last is another question.

Oliver said politicians would always prefer to have powerful people fighting for them, and argued that the permanent campaign dynamics of social media, along with the divisiveness and misinformation of online platforms, are not particularly helpful to those trying to govern.

But, he added, “having massive figures dominating the landscape is not particularly healthy either.”