Kavanagh speaks out after Sun arrests
Journalists arrested on suspicion of payments to police could use a public interest defence, a senior journalist at The Sun has declared.
Trevor Kavanagh, associate editor and a former political editor at the paper, was speaking to the BBC following the arrest and bail of senior journalists at the newspaper.
The journalists were arrested after the company's Management Standards Committee passed information to police, prompting journalists at the paper to accuse News International's standards committee of carrying out a "witch-hunt" to protect the company at the expense of its employees.
Kavanagh said: "If they're talking about payment for stories, that would spread and involve every newspaper in Fleet Street, tabloid or otherwise.
Asked about paying police, he said: "It depends on the circumstances. If there's a a public interest, if it's in the public interest defence, then I think that that's open to debate, and I think that's the test."