Sun Sacks Kelvin McFilth

[Update at end of post]

Once again, it was left to the people at PopBitch to break the news, and once again it confirmed that nothing, but nothing, will be allowed to get in the way of the Sky bid. After retaining his services when even his greatest admirers knew his time had long ago passed, the Murdoch mafiosi have bowed to the inevitable and decided to terminate the twice-weekly column of disgraced former editor Kelvin McFilth.

The PopBitch email was straight and to the point: “By now you’ll have seen that gobshite of the moment Kelvin MacKenzie has dropped himself in it yet again; this time with his imagined headline of Jeremy Corbyn’s knifing … How could a man whose job is hanging in the balance behave in such a reckless manner? Well, the fact is that Kelvin has already been fired. He has been for almost two weeks now”. There was more.

“The Sun are keeping a lid on it until the commotion calms but, somewhat awkwardly, he still has to turn up to the News UK building at London Bridge as (thanks to major investment from Murdoch and Co) he still runs his price comparison website, [A Spokesman Said], out of there”. Was it really true? We soon found out.

Although Jim Waterson of BuzzFeed UK cautioned “Spokesperson for The Sun insists Kelvin McKenzie is still merely suspended, rather than sacked” - which could of course be justified by Kel still coming in to the office to deal with his piss-poor price comparison site - broadcaster James O’Brien was in no doubt the PopBitch story was right.

“In a rare outbreak of professionalism, I've actually double-sourced this to be true but was holding off revealing it for fear of jinxing!” he Tweeted, suggesting he already had the news from one other source, adding “I'm told it was drug dealers/Liverpool comment in Barkley story that did for him. Defence of ignorance re Nigerian heritage was believed”.

That, of course, begs the question of why all those who saw Kel’s fateful column - now widely believed to have been the last straw that prompted Everton FC to ban the Sun, just as Stanley Park neighbours Liverpool had already done - didn’t have the offending passage edited out, given the paper already had the information which showed they knew all too well about Ross Barkley’s Nigerian heritage.

But what Kel’s sacking underscores is that nothing that could potentially derail the all-important Sky bid will be allowed to get in the way. It also shows that control within the Cosa Rupra is passing, with the certainty of night following day, from Rupert Murdoch to his sons, most especially James Murdoch. And Murdoch Junior, unlike his father, has no sentimental attachment to print media.

Bye bye Kel ... so who is next?

Let me translate that: if the Murdochs are prepared to sack Kelvin McFilth, they are prepared to sack anyone. Kel was believed to have the backing of Sun editor Tony Gallagher - that, clearly, no longer counts at the Baby Shard bunker. The old print media guard is disposable. So if push came to shove and it was necessary to send the Sun the same was as the late and not at all lamented Screws, would the Murdochs do it?

And the answer is, yes they would. As the Sun has, relatively recently, been involved in illegal information gathering - blagging - there could be grounds to do so. Sky is that important. The papers are not. What you will not read in the Sun.

[UPDATE 15 May 1720 hours: the Murdoch mafiosi have now confirmed that Kelvin McFilth has officially left the building.

The manner of his leaving is as comprehensive as it is brutal: "Further to our statement on 15 April that Kelvin MacKenzie’s services as a columnist for the Sun were suspended, we can confirm that Mr MacKenzie’s column will not return to the Sun and his contract with News Group Newspapers has been terminated by mutual consent" reads the official statement.

What is more, "News UK is no longer a shareholder in A Spokesman Said Ltd ... The shares have been transferred to Kelvin MacKenzie". So Kel's piss-poor price comparison website and its operations have also been cleared out.

As the Guardian has reported, Kel "is also understood to have given up his office at News UK’s London Bridge headquarters, from which he ran A Spokesman Said".

But it's possible he may have received a severance payment. Not that the SOB merited one]