Glover's shock confession: 'I admire Nick Davies'

The Independent's media commentator Stephen Glover (left) once described Nick Davies as "the sort of journalist who can find a scandal in a jar of tadpoles" but today he admits his admiration for the Guardian journalist's reporting of the News of the World phone hacking story.

Glover writes in the Independent today: "This scandal might never have resurfaced had it not been for the Guardian's Nick Davies, who in July 2009 revealed that News International had paid £700,000 to Gordon Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballer's Association, because the News of the World had hacked into his phone.

"Mr Davies stuck to his guns and bravely took on News International. I do not share his views about the complete dysfunctionality of the tabloid Press, but it is impossible not to admire him. I once teased him for being 'the sort of journalist who can find a scandal in a jar of tadpoles'. This has turned out to be some jar."

Glover, in the Independent in July 2009 wrote: "Mr Davies is a journalist who dislikes much journalism, especially of the tabloid variety. He recently published a book which suggests that the press is wildly dysfunctional. I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting him, but he seems to me a misanthropic, apocalyptic sort of fellow – the sort of journalist who can find a scandal in a jar of tadpoles."

The article was headlined: 'The BBC has conspired with the Guardian to heat up an old story and attack Murdoch.'

• On the wider implications of the phone hacking affair, Glover says today: "Where will this end? Not, I hope, in the demonisation of the entire Press and statutory regulation. If that is to be avoided, the News of the World, and other tabloids, must show that they do not believe they can act outside the law."