Amanda Platell

Amanda Platell (born 1st January 1957)  is an Australian  journalist. Between 1999 and 2001 she was the press secretary to  William Hague, the then leader of the British  Conservative Party.  She is currently a UK-based journalist. ==Early life[ edit] ==

Platell was born in Perth, Western Australia.[1]  Her father was a journalist working for The West Australian newspaper and her mother was a secretary. Platell graduated with an Honours Degree in Politics and Philosophy from theUniversity of Western Australia,[1]  her first job was in 1978 when she joined the Perth Daily News.[3] ==Early British career[ edit] ==

<p style="line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">After a backpacking tour of the world with her then fiancee John Chenery, she arrived in London in 1985. Aiming to earn enough money to return home she worked as a freelancer for publications including The Observer and the Sunday Express.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">After being part of the start-up team of Today, she then joined Robert Maxwell's short-lived London Daily News, before returning under Today editor David Montgomery in 1987 as deputy editor. In 1993 she was appointed managing editor of the Mirror Group, and then moved in the same year to The Independent, initially as marketing director and then managing director.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">In 1996 she joined the Sunday Mirror as acting editor, where she was the superior of Labour party's later director of communications, Alastair Campbell. In 1998 she was appointed acting editor of the Sunday Express, a position she was sacked from by Rosie Boycott following the publication of details of Peter Mandelson's gay relationship with his Brazilian partner.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">In 1999, Platell published a novel Scandal, about women in the newspaper industry. "Two editors, one paper, may the best woman win" was how the cover summarised the plot. ==Later media career<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;padding-right:0.25em;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;direction:ltr;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="transition:color100msease-out,margin100msease-out;-webkit-transition:color100msease-out,margin100msease-out;">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="transition:color100msease-out,margin100msease-out;-webkit-transition:color100msease-out,margin100msease-out;visibility:visible;">] ==

<p style="line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">From 2002 she contributed as a freelancer to the Daily Mail,.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">On 21 November 2011, at the Leveson Inquiry into the culture, practice and ethics of the British press, Platell was accused by Hugh Grant of a "hatchet job" on his recent fatherhood following an article she wrote for the Daily Mail.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19.1875px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13px;">She has recently written articles calling for greater restrictions on Internet pornography.