[July 22, 2011] Phone-hacking scandal shows "murky relationships": deputy premier Tweet LONDON, Jul 21, 2011 (dpa - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- The escalating phone-hacking scandal has revealed "murky practices and dodgy relationships" at the heart of the British establishment, Britain's deputy prime minister said Thursday. Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat deputy to Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, was speaking after the premier was forced to answer more than a hundred questions from lawmakers in an emergency session of parliament Wednesday. The affair, which started with accusations that the News of the World tabloid had hacked the phones of royals and celebrities, has now led to the resignations of two of the most senior police officers in Britain, the prime minister's head of communications, and several figures within Rupert Murdoch's media empire. It has also seen the closure of the Sunday tabloid, and the withdrawal of News Corp's bid for BSkyB. Speaking at a press conference, Clegg said: "I think that we now have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to really clean up the murky practices and dodgy relationships which have taken root at the very heart of the British establishment between the press, politicians and the police." Clegg said the hacking scandal, and allegations that police officers were paid by the press for information, had "shaken" faith in the police and lowered public opinion of politicians even further. Meanwhile, it emerged that one of the figures at the centre of the row, Andy Coulson, worked for Cameron at Downing Street without full security clearance. Coulson had already resigned as editor of the News of the World in 2007 over the initial phone-hacking scandal. Cameron employed him as his press advisor both in opposition and on becoming prime minister in 2010, until he was forced to resign in January this year, again over the phone-hacking issue. The lower-level security status meant Coulson did not face having the most rigorous forensic checks made into his past to find anything that could compromise him. To see more of dpa, go to http://www.dpa.de/English.82.0.html Copyright (c) 2011, dpa, Berlin Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit www.mctinfoservices.com. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]