Corbyn Threatens Murdoch Empire

When the right-leaning part of the Fourth Estate - which means most of it - discovered that Labour, under the leadership of Mil The Younger, intended if elected to support the victims of press misbehaviour and follow through on the Leveson Inquiry and subsequent report, the result was a barrage of highly personal and often gratuitous abuse. No mere politician would be allowed to challenge the right of the press to please themselves.

And so along has come the Labour leadership contest, with that same press suggesting that the ideal successor to Miliband - in other words, the one who would be most likely to leave them alone to carry on trashing ordinary folks’ lives so the proprietors and editors can score a few more sales - would be (their assumption, I stress) someone like Liz Kendall, and certainly not the likes of Andy Burnham or Jeremy Corbyn.

After all, both Burnham and Corbyn have refused to give special treatment to Rupe’s downmarket troops at the Super Soaraway Currant Bun, and so the Murdoch empire has put them on its own version of the naughty step. But there is more to it than that, as the FT has revealed: Corbyn has suggested the breaking-up of Rupe’s UK media empire, and that, for the Dirty Digger’s devotees, means war.

Moreover, it does not only mean war with the Murdoch empire, but also the rest of the right-wing press. After all, if Jezza wants to go after Rupe, they could be next. Best not stand on ceremony and put the boot in first. That explains the frankly unhinged dystopian drivel peddled by yesterday’s Mail On Sunday on what the first 1,000 days of a Corbyn premiership would look like - or maybe not.

What Corbyn was outlining to the FT, of course, was not some personal and vindictive crusade - unlike that run by the press against Miliband - but media plurality. “We need a media that is not controlled by a very small number of very big interests … [Mr Murdoch] should understand that we’re very serious about diversity of media ownership”. The UK had “far too much concentration of news organisations in the hands of the few”.

In truth, Murdoch is in a unique situation here, because of that 39% stake in Sky, which he and his pals may be looking to revisit so they can corner some or all of the 61% they do not yet own. Sky is the UK’s biggest broadcaster in terms of revenue. Taken together with the Sun and Times titles, that gives Creepy Uncle Rupe a significant voice, so it is not surprising that Corbyn should use his empire as an example.

What it means for the Labour leadership campaign and after, though, is that the right-wing press - that owned by not just Murdoch, but also the Rothermeres, the Barclay Brothers and Richard Desmond - will have been spooked to the extent that they will be prepared to lash out at Corbyn - and, indeed, anyone else who suggests they should not be allowed to operate as they wish, whatever the consequences.

Expect the level of abuse directed at Corbyn to increase from now on. You read it here first.