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Re: Cable 'declared war on Murdoch'
Quote:
Originally Posted by Flyboy
You're kidding right? Cameron won't go against his puppet-masters.
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How soon they forget......
I could have sworn New Labour toadied up to News International for 12 years (97-09)...
Independent
Quote:
According to Andrew Neil, Murdoch met Blair for the first time on 15 September 1994 over dinner. In July 1995, Blair flew to Australia to address a News Corporation management conference. There he made it clear that he had dumped Labour's long-standing policy to force News International to reduce its media holdings.
By early 1997, Blair had convinced Murdoch that he would not move against News Corp's interest once he was in power, and that he would hold off from joining the European Monetary Union. On Monday 18 March 1997, the first day of the election campaign, Blair and Major woke up to the realisation that the earth had moved. Murdoch's Sun newspaper, after nearly two decades of backing the Conservative Party, had changed horses.
However, by early 1998 the price for this special relationship was beginning to become apparent. Three separate strands came together for them in February and March of 1998. The first was Murdoch's ongoing quest to swing a deal with Silvio Berlusconi [Murdoch had offered Berlusconi, the then Italian opposition leader, £4bn to take over Berlusconi's Italian television network, Mediaset].
The second strand was the price war that Murdoch's News International newspapers had been waging in Britain since 1993. By late 1997, backbenchers in the new Labour government were concerned enough about the threat that Murdoch's price policy posed to the future of newspapers such as The Independent, to agitate for legal bans on anti-competitive pricing – Murdoch made an appointment to see Tony Blair at Downing Street. In February 1998, Blair drew criticism from Labour ranks by opposing the amendment on predatory pricing, which was passed in the House of Lords. Tony Blair announced that his government would not support the amendment, and it would not be passed in the House of Commons.
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