TV star slams tabloid 'mafia'

Steve Coogan. Photo / Supplied

After years of stories about his foibles and peccadilloes, comedian Steve Coogan argued yesterday that his "closet is empty of skeletons" and he is "immune" to media onslaught.

The actor took to the witness box at the Leveson inquiry to spend nearly two hours explaining his iniquitous treatment by British newspapers over nearly two decades.

The I'm Alan Partridge star said he had never declared himself a "paragon of virtue" and deliberately not sought fame. "I am an actor, comedian and a writer. I never entered a Faustian pact with the press. I did not become successful in my work through embracing or engaging in celebrity culture. I never signed away my privacy in return."

Noting that it had been clear for a number of years that "some tabloid editors and proprietors" did not approve of his occasionally colourful personal life, he added: "I do not believe that gives them the right to hack my voicemail, intrude into my privacy or the privacy of people who know me, or print damaging lies."

Coogan said he had twice been the subject of sting phone tactics by Andy Coulson, former head of communications for Prime Minister David Cameron, while he was working for Rupert Murdoch's News International.

The star said he also was often under surveillance, with photographers sitting outside his home and reporters occasionally going through his bins. He claimed a reporter who later identified himself as working for the Daily Mirror had phoned his daughter's great-grandmother pretending to be doing a survey for her local council, and a News of the World journalist had visited his local pub in Brighton on a "fishing trip" offering money for stories about him.

The inquiry heard that Coogan did not consider that the press had conducted a personal vendetta against him but instead operated like the "mafia - nothing personal, just business".

He added: "There needs to be a mechanism for a privacy law so that genuine public interest journalism isn't besmirched by this tawdry muckracking.

- INDEPENDENT