The editor of the Mail on Sunday "rebuked” the newspaper's managing editor for not telling him about the use of “inquiry agents”.

Editor Peter Wright answered questions on private investigator Steve Whittamore, whose files were investigated by the Information Commissioner Office's Operation Motorman, at the Leveson Inquiry today.

Wright told the inquiry he rebuked managing editor John Wellington because he had been filing invoices for the use of "inquiry agents" as accommodation expenses.

Rober Jay, the inquiry counsel, pointed out that even after Wright new Wellington had been concealing the use of private eyes, he was sent by Wright to examine evidence produced by the Information Commissioner’s Office on Operation Motorman last year, and might have been “overanxious” to check it.

Wright claimed Wellington was not someone “who deliberately hides things” and, at the time, it had not been suspected that Whittamore was engaged in illegal activities.

A 2006 ICO report showed 266 transactions for allegedly illegally-obtained information between Whittamore and the Mail on Sunday, who was commissioned by 33 journalists.

In his statement to the inquiry Wright said that he wasn’t aware of the practice until Operation Motorman, when he imposed restrictions. Whittamore continued to work for the paper until late 2004, following his arrest in 2003. He was paid a total of £20,000.

Leveson told Wright: “[There was] something going on in your newsroom that you clearly weren't aware of".

He pointed out that Whittamore, found guilty of obtaining and disclosing information under the Data Protection Act in 2005, may not have been commissioned for all the data he supplied to journalists. He said journalists may have been offered some of the data by the investigator.

Wright also said he had “absolutely no evidence” to suggest phone-hacking had taken place at the paper.