£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

Nicholas Hellen: NISA to see you, to see you NISA

The new Private Eye reports that the Sunday Times news editor Nicholas Hellen - aka Lord Percy, because of his airs - is in trouble again. Reporter Abul Taher has filed an official complaint over Percy's alleged habit of calling him a "suicide bomber". It is always distressing when one's sense of humour is not fully appreciated, and Percy has my full sympathy.

I now learn that NISA - the News International Staff Assoiciation - is lodging a complaint against Hellen over his treatment of colleagues.

Arcatistes will recall that Percy has an unfortunate habit of being taken for a bully - it is a matter of much astonishment that News International, which lately has adopted a more civilised approach to staff management (apparently), seems quite hopeless in the early identification of dysfunctional staff conduct and dealing with it as required by law. This whole matter reflects on the poor judgement of senior editors at the paper. But then Hellen must have acquired his set of values from someone.