Undercover officer spied on Starmer in libel case

An undercover police officer has admitted that he spied on Keir Starmer while he was a radical barrister, a public inquiry heard yesterday.

- Rob Evans and Kiran Stacey

The police spy has said that he accessed confidential details of the legal advice Starmer was giving to two environmentalist campaigners in the well-known McLibel case in the early 1990s.

The contents of the advice were then relayed by the spy to his managers in a covert Scotland Yard unit, the inquiry was told yesterday.

At the time, the prime minister was building a reputation as a civil liberties barrister championing causes as diverse as striking trade unionists to prisoners who had been sentenced to death around the world.

One of the cases concerned a pair of environmental campaigners, Helen Steel and Dave Morris, who-in a David v Goliath case - were sued for libel by McDonald's over a leaflet they had distributed criticising the company's practices.

Confronted with the legal might of the fast food giant, the pair turned to Starmer, who gave them free advice on defending themselves. The pair could not afford lawyers to represent them in what turned out to be the longest civil trial in English history.