0710 GMT London Saturday 12 May 2012 Editor © Muhammad Haque Leveson Inquiry caves in again! Rebekah Wade performs as Murdoch would have wanted & Cameron would have needed! [To be continued]

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How it went sour with Gordon Brown: Rebekah Brooks reveals how former PM was 'incredibly aggressive' after Sun switched sides to Tories (and how Blair 'fed her stories' about his rival)

• Former PM became 'incredibly aggressive and angry' after front page story about spelling mistakes in letter to mother of dead soldier
• Quizzed over claims that Tony Blair fed her damaging stories about Brown
• Admits David Cameron, George Osborne, William Hague, Theresa May and Tony Blair sent her messages of support after she quit in wake of phone hacking scandal
• But Brown would have 'hung out the bunting' at the news she says
• Cameron apologised for cutting her loose and said: 'Sorry I couldn’t have been as loyal to you as you have been to me, but Ed Miliband has me on the run'
• The pair 'signed off messages to each other with kisses'
• Met Tony Blair 30 times for dinner between 1997 and 2007
• Cherie Blair complained about 'sexist' coverage and 'cruelty' about weight
• Sun had 'consent' from Browns to run story about son having cystic fibrosis 
• But Browns deny volunteering any information to paper

By RICK DEWSBURY

PUBLISHED: 09:44, 11 May 2012 | UPDATED: 23:06, 11 May 2012

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Former News International boss Rebekah Brooks revealed how she was at war with Gordon Brown after the Sun switched support to the Tories.

The ex-News of the World editor said that conversations with Mr Brown had become 'incredibly aggressive and angry' after the Sun declared its support for David Cameron.

She also said Tony Blair passed information to her on rival Mr Brown as the pair's relationship became 'increasingly worse' before the last election, the Leveson Inquiry heard today.

Mrs Brooks made the astonishing admissions about her relationships with Prime Ministers while giving evidence at the inquiry into press standards.

Revelations: Rebekah Brooks gives evidence to the Leveson Inquiry today as she discusses emails and texts between politicians

Mrs Brooks swears an oath before giving evidence to the Leveson Inquiry today, in which she admitted receiving an apology from David Cameron

Mrs Brooks disclosed a string of meetings with Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron since 1997 while she was editor of the Sun, and then boss of News International - the UK arm of Rupert Murdoch's news Corporation.

She told how she had been close to Mr Blair and enjoyed 'very frequent' contact on his personal landline while he was in office.

But her most vitriolic relationship with a Prime Minister was with Gordon Brown. She said that she was among those who decided to ditch support for Mr Brown over his apparent reluctance to support troops in Afghanistan.

Mrs Brooks said she was 'instrumental' in the timing of the switch of support after Gordon Brown's speech at the Labour party conference in 2009.

She said she had tried to get hold of Mr Brown at the conference the night before the paper was due to declare its support.

Mrs Brooks and her racehorse trainer husband Charlie Brooks leave High Court in London today after the former News International boss gave evidence

Tough day: Mrs Brooks leaves in a Black Range Rover after giving evidence to Leveson Inquiry

'Mr Brown and his wife were due to come to the News International party that night and I wanted to get hold of them,' she said. 

'The reason for that night is because Mr Brown's speech … the key was that he spent less than two minutes on Afghanistan. We felt that was the right timing in order to distance ourselves.'

Mr Mandelson 'seemed quite angry, but not surprised' while Gordon Brown 'didn't want to talk to me', she said.

Mrs Brooks also told the inquiry she had not told Ed Balls to fire former Haringey head of children's services Sharon Shoesmith over the Baby P scandal.

'I think he was well aware we had called for her resignation, it was all over the paper,' she said.

'I did not tell Ed Balls to fire Sharon Shoesmith. It was obvious in our paper that we had launched a petition because the government were refusing to do anything about the situation.'

She said she spoke to Mr Balls, and also to a shadow minister, possibly Michael Gove, at the time, adding: 'I would have spoken to anybody, basically, to try and get some justice for Baby P, which was the point of the campaign.'

What will she tell? Former News International boss Rebekah Brooks arrives before giving evidence to the Leveson Inquiry today. Her husband Charlie Brooks is in the car with her

Mrs Brooks admitted that there had been a negative reaction from Sun readers to its front-page story about Mr Brown's letter to the mother of a dead soldier that contained spelling mistakes the following month.

She told of an 'extraordinarily aggressive' conversation with Mr Brown.

'I remember it quite clearly because it was in response to the Sun splash on a letter that Gordon Brown had written to a bereaved mother whose son had died in Afghanistan.

'He had had some spelling mistakes or got the wrong name or something but the Sun had been particularly harsh to him about it...

'He rang me... it was a private conversation but the tone of it was very aggressive. Quite rightly, he was hurt by the (presentation) and the headline that had been put on the story.'

Mrs Brooks said she reassured the then-prime minister that the coverage had been a 'mistake', and did not reflect the attitude The Sun would be taking to him.

'Mr Brown was very angry, I'm not sure there was anything particularly relevant to this inquiry. Mr Murdoch told me the same story that he told you,' says Brooks.

Mrs Brooks said that Mr Murdoch had similar conversations with Mr Brown after the Sun abandoned Labour.

She said: 'When Mr Murdoch told me his conversation it didn't surprise me. He told me exactly what he told the inquiry.'

Former PM Tony Blair dined 30 times with Rebekah Brooks but his successor Gordon Brown was furious after News International switched support to Tories

Close: Former Prime Minister Tony Blair speaks to Mrs Brooks at en event in 2009

She said the PM became 'incredibly aggressive and angry' towards her and that there were suggestions that he had 'declared war' on News Corp.

Mrs Brooks dismissed a question from Mr Jay that the Labour leader could have harmed the commercial interests of News International if he had won the elections in 2012.

She said: 'I didn't think that. At not any point in the conversation with Mr Brown if he wins he will go against the commercial interests of the company. He was just incredibly aggressive and angry.'

Mr Murdoch told the Inquiry earlier this year that Mr Brown was 'unbalanced' after the switch of political support.

Mr Murdoch said that Mr Brown told him: 'Well, your company has declared war on my government and we have no alternative but to make war on your company.'

Mrs Brooks claimed that the Browns had given consent for a story to appear in the Sun about their child having cystic fibrosis - contrary to claims from the former PM that it came from illicit sources.

In a statement tonight, Mr and Mrs Brown expressed concern that it was still unclear how The Sun obtained details of their son's medical condition.

'The idea that we would have volunteered our permission or were happy that a story about our son's health was about to enter the public domain is untrue,' they said.

'We remain concerned that there is no satisfactory explanation of how private medical information, known to very few people, got into the hands of The Sun and the possible payments involved.'

She suggested Mr Brown had made the allegation as a ‘smear’, outlining how their relationship deteriorated after the Sun switched its support to the Conservatives in 2009. 

Mrs Brooks said she had tried to warn Mr Brown about the switch but succeeded only in reaching Lord Mandelson, in a phone call in which he was reported to have called News International ‘a bunch of c****’. He later claimed he had said ‘chumps’.

The Leveson Inquiry heard that stories in the Sun criticising Mr Brown may have been leaked by Mr Blair. Robert Jay QC, counsel for the inquiry, told Mrs Brooks it has been suggested that she passed on material gained from Mr Brown to Mr Blair.

Mrs Brooks replied: 'No it isn't (true). And I think your source might be John Prescott. It's not true.'

Mr Jay suggests a story about Blair's plan to lead Labour for another five years in 2005 had been 'planted' by the former PM.

Mr Jay said: 'Was it Blair, did he plant it?'. Mrs Brooks replied: 'I can't tell you that at all.'

Friendly: Rebekah Brooks is recorded kissing David Cameron as she welcomes him to a glamorous party attended by a string of influential figures 

Friends: Mr Cameron appears startles after being photographed alongside Mrs Brooks at a book launch in 2009. The pair are said to have texted each other regularly

Ms Brooks disclosed details of her meetings with senior politicians over more than a decade, although she stressed that they were merely from her secretary's diary and 'very incomplete'.

She met or dined with Mr Blair at least 30 times between 1998 and 2007, including three times in June 1998. But Ms Brooks said there were only around three occasions when they dined alone.

'NOTHING INAPPROPRIATE' ABOUT MEETINGS WITH POLICE 

There was nothing inappropriate about her dealings with senior police officers, Mrs Brooks told the Leveson Inquiry today.

The former News International chief executive handed a list of meetings with senior officers and commissioners between 1999 and 2010 to the inquiry into press standards.

Her records include meetings with former Metropolitan Police head of communications Dick Fedorcio, as well as former commissioners Sir Paul Stephenson and Sir Ian Blair, and former assistant commissioner John Yates.

Sir Paul Stephenson and Mr Yates both resigned over the controversy over the hiring of ex-News of the World deputy editor Neil Wallis as a consultant.

Mr Fedorcio, who has also resigned, has told the inquiry that he hired Mr Wallis because he wanted someone he knew and trusted.

Mrs Brooks today said meetings with senior police officers would sometimes include The Sun's crime editor, and may have sometimes been about The Sun-backed Police Bravery Awards.

'I felt that the contact I had with police officers, particularly commissioners and senior police officers, in that kind of context was always appropriate," she said.

'I never saw any of my dealings with the police, I never saw inappropriate conversations take place.'

She said at the bravery awards, she saw journalists come into contact with officers from the Metropolitan Police, as well as from across the country.

'I always thought they were very useful for both sides rather than inappropriate but there's always a risk that that is not the case.'

She said some meetings with senior police officers would take place at restaurants as they were 'neutral'.

'Senior police officers were more inclined to want to go to a neutral venue like a restaurant, whereas a lot of meetings with politicians took place either in Wapping HQ or at party conferences, or at Downing Street or various ministries, that was in my experience.'

Asked if she exchanged work experience for Mr Fedorcio's son at The Sun, for the acquisition of a retired police horse she was loaned by Scotland Yard from 2008 to 2010, Mrs Brooks replied: 'absolutely not'.

After Mr Brown took over as Prime Minister in 2007, they met or dined at least five times including once at the Browns' home.

Ms Brooks recorded one lunch and four dinners with Mr Cameron in 2010, after he had taken power. One was the widely-reported Christmas dinner party at the Brooks' Oxfordshire home on December 23.

Despite enjoying a close relationship with Mr Blair, she said she received complaines from Cherie Blair about coverage of her weight.

She said: 'Cherie Blair was concerned that she felt a lot of her coverage was quite sexist. But she's not the first high-profile female to think that about the UK media. She sometimes felt it was quite cruel about her weight.'

Mrs Brooks revealed earlier in the Inquiry that she received an apology from David Cameron after she was forced out of her top job in the Murdoch empire over the phone hacking scandal.

David Cameron texted former News International boss Mrs Brooks, telling her to 'keep her head up' after she resigned from News International last July.

But the Prime Minister followed the messages of support with an apology for having to cut her loose and end the 'cosy' relationship.

Mrs Brooks told the Leveson Inquiry that she received an 'indirect' message in which the PM said 'Sorry I couldn’t have been as loyal to you as you have been to me, but Ed Miliband had me on the run'.

Mrs Brooks arrived at the Inquiry at the Royal Courts of Justice in London in a black Land Rover at 9.15 am with her racehorse trainer husband Charlie Brooks.

The ex-editor was greeted by a man dressed as a pantomime horse - a joke about the 'horsegate' saga in which it emerged she had been loaned a former Metropolitan Police horse.

Mrs Brooks admitted that she received messages of support from a string of Tory politicians and 'some Labour' after leaving her job as Chief Executive at News International when it emerged that the phone of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler had been hacked.

She said the messages had come from David Cameron, George Osborne, William Hague and Theresa May.

It has also been claimed that the 43-year-old former editor and Mr Cameron exchanged more than 12 text messages a day - which they signed off with a 'x'.

The revelations from Mrs Brooks - who is on bail over phone hacking an payments to police - will pile yet more pressure on the PM who has been criticised for his 'too cosy' relationship with the Murdoch empire.

Ms Brooks said she only had access to around six weeks of texts and emails from her time as NI chief executive, from the beginning of June to July 17 last year.

Only one of those emails was relevant to the inquiry, according to her evidence.

One of the text messages had been from Mr Cameron, but the content was compressed and unreadable, she said.

Robert Jay QC, counsel for the inquiry, asked Ms Brooks about reports that she had received sympathetic messages after her resignation last July.

'I had some indirect messages from some politicians but nothing direct,' she replied.

'A variety - some Tories a couple of Labour politicians. Very few Labour politicians.

'I received some indirect messages from Number 10, Number 11, the Home Office, the Foreign Office...'

She said Tony Blair had been among them but Gordon Brown had not.

'He was probably getting the bunting out,' she added, provoking laughter in the courtroom.

Questioned on whether reports were correct that Mr Cameron's message had urged her to 'keep your head up', Ms Brooks responded: 'Along those lines.'

Pressed on whether the premier had also conveyed regret that political circumstances meant he could not be more 'loyal', Ms Brooks replied: 'Similar, but very indirect.'

After answering questions about emails and text from politicians, she was asked about her relationship with Rupert Murdoch. She said that spoke to him regularly while editing the Sun but denied going swimming together with Murdoch when he visits London. 

Mrs Brooks denied that after being arrested in 2005 over a row at party with her ex-husband Ross Kemp Mr Murdoch sent a dress to the police station.

Mr Jay said: 'You had been to Matthew Freud's 42nd birthday. You kept Mr Murdoch waiting for a breakfast meeting and he sent a dress to the police station?'

Mrs Brooks replied by joking: 'You need better sources, Mr Jay.'