Sally Bercow in hot water over ‘paedo tweet’
COMMONS Speaker’s wife Sally Bercow gave “a nudge and a wink” to Twitter followers when she named Lord McAlpine after allegations a Tory politician was a paedophile, a libel hearing at the High Court heard yesterday.
The tweet was posted last November, two days after a BBC2 Newsnight report wrongly implicated the 70-year-old politician in abuse claims at Bryn Estyn children’s home in the 1970s and 1980s.
Mrs Bercow denied her tweet, “Why is Lord McAlpine trending? *Innocent face”, was defamatory.
Mr Justice Tugendhat will decide if the tweet was defamatory at a later date. If it is, a separate hearing will be held to decide the amount of damages owed.