Leveson Inquiry: Elle Macpherson's Former Adviser 'Told To Go Into Rehab' (Live Updates)

Elle Macpherson's Ex-Adviser Fired After Being Wrongly Accused Of Leaking Stories

Elle Macpherson's former adviser has recounted how she was fired after the supermodel wrongly believed she had leaked stories to the press about her private life.

In fact the stories in 2005 about Macpherson's split with her then husband are believed to have been obtained from hacked voicemails.

Mary-Ellen Field told the Leveson inquiry into press ethics on Tuesday that Macpherson had her home swept for bugs after "tittle-tattle" about her private life began appearing the papers.

"We had the house checked, the car checked and the phone checked and they found nothing," Field said. "We now know that wasn't how they were getting the messages."

Macpherson is said to have then accused Field of leaking stories to the press and told her: "You've been doing it without my permission."

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The model also told Field she would be fired as her business adviser unless she checked herself into a rehabilitation clinic for alcoholism.

Field told the inquiry that while she was not an alcoholic she agreed to attend the rehab centre in order to keep her job and support her family.

Lord Justice Leveson told Field that what had occurred was "not her fault" and that she was "collateral damage" .

After being discharged from the facility Macpherson fired her anyway. Field was then made redundant by her employer, Chiltern, in 2006 after she lost the Macpherson account.

The inquiry has also heard from former premier league footballer Garry Flitcroft, who said he believed the Sunday People had hacked his phone in order to obtain stories alleging he had extra-marital affairs.

“I strongly suspect that my phone was hacked by a journalist and as a result the second woman was contacted and asked to sell her story to the paper,” he said.

While he said he had no proof that his voicemails had been accessed, he told the inquiry that it would be a “massive coincidence” if the paper had been able to connect the two women he was alleged to have had affairs with as "one lived in Stockport and one lived in Chester".

Comedian Steve Coogan, an outspoken critic of the News of the World, is due to address the inquiry later today.

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