Eve Pollard OBE: A one-woman gallery in bones booklet

There I was minding my own business in a public waiting room when I had the creepy feeling of being stared at. It took me a moment or two to identify the ogler.

It was Eve Pollard OBE. One-time editor of the Sunday Mirror and Sunday Express. Inter alia!

Not that the poppet was actually in the room. Her translucently youthful visage stared out from the cover of a booklet on the wall shelf dedicated to the fascinating topic of osteoporotic women. I thought I was seeing double at first until I realised that there were two cover images of the woman Private Eye once dubbed La Bollard.

Why two? I mean, is the booklet about bones or Boll? Fascinated I opened the publication, unfortunately titled Breaking the Silence (as in snap, crackle etc), and there I found a third image of the woman whose fringe definitely needs pruning. Turn the page again and... you guessed it. Yet another snap of the grand lady of tabloid hell (emeritus), her head tilted to one side to signify her engaged focus.

Indeed, there are six pics of Eve in the eight page booklet (including front and back covers). I can only assume that her multiple appearances of undaunted vim are intended to inspire women to sweep up their bone crumbs and do something to stick them together again. Well, I guess.

But at least the woman who used to send out photographers to take pictures of desired shoes in shop windows is doing something useful with herself. Something selfless. And if that means the admiring over-attentiveness of the camera, so be it.

Michael Jackson libel case: Why Jane Preston was never going to lose

The Jacksons Are Coming promo/Studio Lambert

While I still linger here in Google Hell, my congrats to film director Jane Preston. She, Studio Lambert and C4 have just seen off a frivolous libel action over her 2008 Michael Jackson TV doc, The Jacksons Are Coming. MJ's penniless former bodyguard Matthew Fiddes dropped his lawsuit, claiming the film was 'fabricated', after racking up costs of £3m, £1.7m of which C4 must pay nonetheless. For why, read here.

I had no doubt of Jane's integrity because of my past dealings with her. She is both courageous and principled.

Of the former virtue: in the early '90s she took on Mirror Group when the People's then editor, the ghastly bully Bridget Rowe (now Ukip Nigel Farage's press sec), fired her for being pregnant. Naturally the socialist organ denied any such thing, but on the court steps, Mirror Group settled the case and gave Jane a lot of lolly. I had played my tiny part in this, writing a long exposé of Rowe's illegal management style for Private Eye, but Jane herself never once thought of backing down. She is a lionheart.

Of the latter virtue: while at the People (pre-Rowe), Jane was commissioned to interview her friend Boy George by the paper's magazine supplement. He wouldn't have spoken to anyone else from the paper. Unfortunately, the then editor, the late Richard Stott, had an abiding loathing of the popstar. He held George responsible for the death of a friend's grownup child through drugs.

When Stott read Jane's sympathetic but newsy piece, he went ballistic and ordered his writer-lapdog Mary Riddell (who churns for the Telegraph now) to re-do it to ensure readers were reminded that George was the chemicals anti-Christ. Somehow Jane got wind of this and at final proof stage undid some of Riddell's damage so that the final piece was broadly as she wrote it. This earned Jane her first firing from the paper and my abiding admiration.

In my experience people very rarely alter over time. Chin-chin, Jane!

A 'bullying' Prime Minister, but what of Andy Coulson?

Tory leader David Cameron calls for an inquiry into Gordon Brown's "bullying" conduct towards his staff with the suggestion he's unfit for high office. Quite right. But what a pity Cameron didn't call for an inquiry into - and has not publicly addressed once - the bullying conduct of someone very close to himself, the Tory media boss Andy Coulson. Last year, the former editor's bullying of a sports reporter cost the News of the World £800,000 before costs - a record award for workplace bullying.

Sadly The Times, which laudably publishes a leader today on the bullying claims against the PM - labelling bullies "weak" - was not moved to comment on Coulson's offence at the time.

Come to think of it, why hasn't the National Bullying Helpline - which has confirmed Number 10 staff concerns about the PM - made an issue of Coulson? Questions, questions. Rhetorical.

£800,000 for journalist bullied by Andy Coulson - now the Tories' top spin doctor

The News of the World reporter who was bullied by former editor Andy Coulson and his staff side-kicks has been awarded nearly £800,000 for unfair dismissal and disability discrimination by an east London employment tribunal.

Matt Driscoll will pick up a record £792,736 from Murdoch's News International which with legal costs stands to lose over a £1 million on this case alone.

The tribunal found that Driscoll had been subject to "a consistent pattern of bullying behaviour". "The original source of the hostility towards the claimant [Driscoll] was Mr Coulson ... ". The Guardian reports, "The judgment singled out Coulson for making 'bullying' remarks in an email to Driscoll after the first formal warning, letting him know that he thought he should have been sacked."

Madame Arcati has long campaigned to raise the profile of this case, long after other media went silent. Coulson is the Conservative Party's top spin doctor. Despite Tory pledges to fight bullying in all its forms, Cameron has clung onto Coulson - and no doubt an absence of a media clamour for Coulson's removal will be a comfort. Bullying is the common coin of newspapers. The culture of newspapers promotes bullying. The attributes of the bully are required for editorial preferment.

Ironically, last Sunday, the News of the World went big on its own anti-bullying campaign (schools only, natch) - how hollow that looks now. The Screws these days is an archaic spectacle - a tawdry palace of hypocrites and liars, sad middleclass hacks at a chav masquerade as they clamber and shit all over each other in their prefab open-plan coop. I can't think of a more disgusting publication.

As for Coulson - go! The People needs you! More at Bullying UK.

National newspapers' conspiracy of silence over this payout, click here

Christian Bale: Dickhead's rant turned to dance classic

Screaming Christian Bale's bullying rant at someone on the set of Terminator: Salvation has been turned into a great dance track (with a Barbra Streisand cameo) by RevoLucian.

Bridget Rowe, Libertas UK and a plan to rule Europe?

The monstrous Bridget Rowe - former bullying editor of Labour-supporting organs the Sunday Mirror and The People (and various mags before these) - appears to be the "leader" of new political party Libertas UK, registered on December 19th. The party's address is given as 400 Main Road, Westerham Hill, in Kent, believed to be Rowe's home. Someone on the British Democracy Forum describes the home as "a pleasant looking bungalow currently for sale at £550,000."

I don't know what Libertas is precisely but EU Reporter claims that Rowe is a close pal of Nigel Farage, leader of the right-wing and Eurosceptic party UKIP. Whether there's a connection between UKIP and Libertas UK is unknown. Is this new party anything to do with Declan Ganley's Euro-critical Libertas EU? Surely Rowe has not defected from UKIP and joined Libertas EU to embrace a more democratic Europe? What could the truth be? I'm sure Bridget will tell us.

"Bridget Rowe, whose Fleet Street reputation does not match her own claim on her page at the Jacque Evans Management Ltd web site, has been a speaker at UKIP rallies. She is known in Brussels as a key UKIP player who is close to Nigel Farage. UKIP officials close to the leadership have described her as ''the replacement national press officer'," claims the EU Reporter.

Doubtless her yesteryear leftish editorials on the two Mirror Group tabloids - when David "Rommel" Montgomery ran the place - will provide an interesting contrast to her current political views if Libertas UK turns out to be a bedfellow of UKIP and not Libertas EU.

And I for one shall be most interested to know of her position on bullying in the workplace, whether she's pro- or anti-EU.

More info click here
Libertas UK registration