Rupert Murdoch - dubbed “unfit” by MPs to run an international business - is likely to survive the latest row over the hacking scandal, according to a Kent media expert.

Patrick Barrow, director of Reputation Communications, based near Sevenoaks, and a contributor to a new book on the crisis for journalism, said the personal attack by Labour MP Tom Watson - one of six MPs who backed the controversial claim against four Tories who did not - had helped Murdoch’s cause.

“My feeling is he will probably ride it out,” Mr Barrow said.

“He is a defiant chap and I think he will keep sticking in there. He has bounced back repeatedly and what probably seemed a good idea two days ago to Tom Watson and his gang will probably come back to haunt him.”

Mr Barrow conceded that Murdoch had “undoubtedly abused the power of the press and made it difficult for the well-meaning to argue against much stricter regulation.

"I don’t think he was directly ordering what went on but I don’t think he cared too much either.”

However, Mr Watson’s remarks had made it more difficult for Ofcom, the broadcasting watchdog, to rule that Murdoch, who owns 39.1% of BSkyB, was not a fit person to run a broadcasting company.

If it did so, his lawyers would “rightly ask if it was their decision or Tom Watson’s. In trying to be clever, he has made Ofcom’s decision almost impossible.”

Mr Barrow said that many people did not understand how Murdoch had “rescued” the British newspaper industry. “He is not an unalloyed evil and everyone has forgotten that.”

Meanwhile, shares in News Corporation rose on the news in the expectation that Murdoch might sell his UK News International operation. BSkyB shares rose 2% on results ahead of expectations.

• More on Patrick Barrow and Murdoch in Kent Business, out this week with most KM Group paid-for newspapers,