The first rule of journalism is that 'you don't discuss your sources, or how you got things,' Telegraph assistant editor Benedict Brogan maintained on BBC Question Time on Thursday night.

[Transcript on the Journalism.co.uk Editors' Blog at this link]

Question Time presenter, David Dimbleby, probed Brogan - who last week refused to be drawn on details of any payment - on how the Daily Telegraph had acquired the information which has led to its many revelations about MPs' expenses.

"David, you've been a journalist for even longer than I have and the first rule of journalism [is that] you don't discuss your sources, or how you got things," Brogan said during the programme filmed in Grimsby.

Brogan argued that the paper had taken 'fairly courageous action to put this out into the public domain'. 

"The fact is that the Telegraph has been working on this story for weeks: we've got 25 journalists working on it, lawyers, all sorts of experts looking at it, and I can assure you that a newspaper like the Telegraph, which is a serious newspaper, has not entered into this exercise lightly."

"The things we satisfied ourselves about, were one, that the information is genuine; and two, that it is in the public interest that we publish it," Brogan said.

Dimbleby said he couldn't 'understand' what was brave about the Telegraph's decision to publish.

"When you heard that people were prepared to contemplate the possibility of legal action to prevent the Telegraph from publishing - this is something we had to consider," Brogan responded. 

"The fact is we considered it and we pressed ahead, and as a result the electorate, the British public, are aware of something the MPs did not want released and now people can see it for themselves and draw their own conclusions about their MPs," he said.

MP and former Liberal Democrat leader, Sir Menzies Campbell, asked Brogan to reveal the specific details of the payment, 'to demonstrate the commercial ability' of the Daily Telegraph and its editor.

"I probably shouldn't even tell you if I know the answer," Brogan answered, adding that 'the politicians can try to distract us from the matter at hand by talking about the processes as to how the Telegraph got hold of it, but what is important is what we now know about our MPs'. 

'Theft of information?'
Margaret Beckett, MP, also participating in last night's programme, argued that it was 'not a good thing' that the Telegraph had received information about House of Commons staff.

"Our staff, who are merely employees of members, whose details were all on file, of course, because they are paid through the fees office (...) all of that has been stolen, and that, I think, is not a good thing."

"I'm not suggesting the editor of the Telegraph stole it, but what I am saying is it would appear he is profiting from someone else's theft."

In public interest, says McDonald's UK CEO
CEO of McDonald's UK, Steve Easterbrook, said he felt it was an issue in the public and tax-payers' interest, and that those against the Telegraph's publication of the information had perhaps lost sight of what the country wanted.

"I spend a lot of time in restaurants, that's my job, chatting to staff, chatting to customers. Not one of them has ever made the comment 'wasn't the newspaper wrong to print it'," he said. 

"All the conversations is about the actual detail of course, and we shouldn't fly against the mood of the country on this one."

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