London: The chief political commentator for The Daily Telegraph has resigned over the British newspaper's coverage of the HSBC scandal, alleging it was part of a pattern to downplay critical coverage of the bank in order to preserve lucrative advertising contracts.
Peter Oborne described the paper's lack of coverage of the HSBC tax story as a “fraud on its readers”.
He said it was a “most sinister development” at the broadsheet title, which he described as “the most important conservative-leaning newspaper in Britain”, but where he alleged the traditional distinction between the advertising and editorial departments had collapsed.
Oborne claimed it was a pattern that could be seen elsewhere in the paper's reporting, including its coverage of last year's protests in Hong Kong.
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Oborne said the Telegraph's coverage of HSBC, by putting the interests of a major international bank above its duty to report the news, was a “form of fraud on its readers”.
“There are great issues here. They go to the heart of our democracy, and can no longer be ignored,” he said.
Oborne said the paper avoided stories critical of HSBC since 2013, when the bank cancelled its advertising with the paper following a Telegraph investigation into accounts held with HSBC in Jersey.
He said one former Telegraph executive told him HSBC was “the advertiser you literally cannot afford to offend”.
