James Murdoch testified Tuesday that before Cameron became prime minister, he had met the politician over drinks at a pub and told him the company's Sun newspaper would support his Conservative party in the next election.

The younger Murdoch insisted that he knew little about the scale of phone hacking by people working for the News of the World, as he continued his fight to limit the damage the scandal does to him and his family's media empire.

The scandal has forced News Corp. to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation to the victims of phone hacking.

James and Rupert Murdoch have been hammered over the past year about what they knew about phone hacking by people working for them.

They have always denied knowing about the scale of the practice, which police say could have affected thousands of people, ranging from celebrities and politicians to crime victims and war veterans.