A former Mirror chairman was told about phone hacking claims but did “nothing”, the High Court has heard.

Prince Harry and several public figures are taking legal action against the publisher of the Daily Mirror newspaper in a civil trial.

The claimants allege unlawful information was gathered on behalf of Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) between 1996 and 2010.

MGN has contested the claims and argues that some have been brought too late to be valid.

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Brian Basham, a former investigative journalist and entrepreneur who provided a witness statement for the claimants, has alleged he gathered information about phone hacking by MGN journalists in 2012.

He said he had told Trinity Mirror chairman David Grigson about what he had found at the time and urged him to take action – but Mr Grigson did not act on it, the court was told on Tuesday.

Mr Basham, 79, also accused senior bosses at Trinity Mirror (now known as Reach plc, and the owner of MGN) of an “orchestrated cover-up” of phone hacking.

“This company covered up wrongdoing,” he told the court, saying that as a result, “people suffered for years”.

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Mr Basham – who was a journalist until 1972 – described in a witness statement how he had “started to hear Trinity Mirror had a problem with phone hacking” after he bought £60,000 of stock in the company.

He alleged he had gathered information through friends and sources in the industry – including a former Mirror employee – and decided to take this to Mr Grigson.

But in the following months, Mr Basham said in his witness statement: “David did nothing, or not very much, as far as I could see and I was not sure whether David was actually trying to get to grips with the problem, but he continued to give me assurances that he was.”

Andrew Green KC, representing MGN, said Mr Grigson’s witness statement presented a different story and that Mr Basham had not provided “much to go on” as there was no evidence to support the “gossip”.

Mr Basham agreed the information he had was “gossip” but said Mr Grigson should have used it to look into the matter further.

He said it was a “firm indication from good sources of what had been going on”.

‘Villain of the piece’

In his witness statement, Mr Basham said he had been told of a “cover-up” at Trinity Mirror.

He said the Mirror’s then company secretary Paul Vickers and chief executive Sly Bailey had “orchestrated a cover-up of Trinity Mirror’s phone hacking”.

He described Mr Vickers as “unusually powerful” on the board of Trinity Mirror plc, and said he was told by a source that Mr Vickers was the “villain of the piece” when it came to phone hacking at the company.

Asked by MGN’s barrister why Mr Vickers was not previously identified as one of the hackers, Mr Basham replied: “Because his villainy was involved in the cover-up, not the execution.”

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‘Widespread laughter’ at phone hacking joke

Mr Basham was also questioned about an incident he referred to in his witness statement, in which MGN’s then legal director Marcus Partington was alleged to have joked about phone hacking.

In the statement, Mr Basham said he was told by a trusted source that Mr Partington had said to reporter James Scott: “I left my phone at home, can you check the messages for me.”

This allegedly led to “widespread laughter” in the newsroom.

Mr Green said the witness statement was inconsistent on where the conversation between Mr Partington and Mr Scott happened – whether it was in the newsroom or in Mr Partington’s office.

Mr Basham accepted his information may have been “wrong” on this, but he said the “thrust of it” was true and that “Marcus Partington indicated to a number of people that he knew about phone hacking”.

“There is no doubt that Marcus Partington was tainted,” Mr Basham told the court.

The trial continues.

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