You organise an interview with an upwardly mobile cabinet minister tipped for the top. We look for signs that he is going to be able to show he is the man to run the Olympics. Instead, the news that murdered school girl Milly Dowler’s phone was hacked has broken, the News of the World will shortly print its final edition, and there is a big decision to be made on BSkyB. Jeremy Hunt has found himself in the centre of the firestorm.

We are sitting in his departmental office, either side of the man who would get the second-biggest headache in Whitehall (after David Cameron) when News Corporation hit the headlines for a week.

The secretary of state looks grave at the mention of phone hacking. “Some of the things that are alleged to have happened in the Milly Dowler case, if they have happened, are utterly despicable,” he says, keeping his voice low and even. “They made my stomach churn.”

When we first speak to him, Hunt is initially adamant that there is no connection. “We can’t link phone hacking and media plurality issues on which the News Corp/BSkyB decision is taken. That’s a decision shared with the Labour Party as well.” That attempt to tie in Labour fails when Ed Miliband goes on the offensive, leaving the government initially playing catch-up.

Hunt retains his quasi-judicial role in the takeover, saying he is unable to provide a running commentary on any bid for BSkyB. This position remains in place because News Corporation may resubmit their takeover proposal after a six-month gap. When we sit down with him, he says: “We’ve got to be very careful not to underestimate the importance of media plurality issues. It is incredibly important to make sure no one person has excessive control over our media. That’s why the decision that I said I’m minded to take is one that actually weakens control of the Murdochs over Sky News, increases plurality, puts in lots of protections to ensure that Sky News continues to be impartial and offer people a service that is respectable. That is a very important decision, but it is not the same as the criminal investigation that’s going on into phone hacking, and it would be wrong to link it.”

But what about the idea of corporate responsibility? If, for example, it was your government department reacting to a scandal in one of your offices, you would be expected to know what was going on in that process. “If Ofcom believes that someone running a TV channel is not fit and proper, they’re able to withdraw the licence,” Hunt replies. “They have a very, very strong sanction. I don’t want to second guess what they might decide.”

It is currently unclear what role Hunt will be able to play on the issue of press regulation. The first inquiry by Lord Justice Leveson will report jointly to Theresa May and himself. Now, of course, Hunt has had the immediate pressure lifted off him. His allies insist he was nothing but scrupulous in following the legal process for the takeover, and add Hunt has been frustrated that the process takes so long.

His Commons performance on the Monday, when announcing that the News Corp bid was being referred to the Competition Commission, saw him rattled. He kept his cool, but it was the most pressure he’d been under publicly. Government ministers on the summer party circuit were left divided over whether he had done well in such a limited, defensive position, or if he’d looked exposed and short of top-class political ability.

But these issues cannot take up all of his time. In one year’s time, Britain will host the 2012 Olympic Games, and Hunt says he is “incredibly excited”. He doesn’t exactly leap out of his seat with enthusiasm, but he is a man of measured responses.

“This is a project where there are so many things that could have gone wrong,” he says, “but because of difficult decisions taken by both this government and the last, this is a project that is actually in very good shape.” This is Hunt in classic, emollient form. While the matter of News Corporation saw a fragile coalition between the parties, the Olympics issue is backed by all major political parties.

Hunt is generous in his praise for Labour’s contribution. “That is one of the best things to celebrate about the Olympics; it shows that in a country like Britain, which has one of the most lively and robust democracies in the world – with intense competition between the three major parties – there are projects where the whole country can come together.”

He credits the previous government in part for being ahead of schedule on construction. “Probably the best example is that we will, at the one-year-to-go mark, have completed all the venues for the Olympics a year ahead of time.

“That is the work of both governments. When you look at Wembley, the Dome, the Channel Tunnel, the Scottish Parliament building, Portcullis House, we haven’t covered ourselves in glory in the past in delivering construction on time and to budget. Here, we have the biggest construction project in our history, and it has gone incredibly smoothly.”

If the 60-day event next August runs in a similarly easy manner, then Hunt will have a significant achievement on his cabinet CV. Even if he has had to introduce large spending cuts to his department, the culture, media and sport brief remains one which sparks envious looks from colleagues. As one minister describes the DCMS: “It is a nice department to have”.

Hunt’s laid-back confidence and swift rise to the top have seen him earmarked for great things. “If Hunt can build up a backbench following in the next few years, he will be hard to beat [as future Tory leader],” said an excited Matthew d’Ancona last year. It is noted that, while he still lacks much of a parliamentary support group, the culture secretary has been very active on the ‘rubber-chicken’ circuit, doing constituency events for MPs around the country. “It builds up thanks,” says one member of the government. “Also, the 2005 intake, of which Jeremy is one, wasn’t massive so he gets a higher profile because of that.”

A female Conservative MP notes cheerfully that: “Jeremy is just so friendly and charming. He’s like an old-fashioned gent with excellent manners. He always comes across as helpful.”

Elected in 2005, and promoted to the shadow cabinet in 2007, Hunt played Nick Clegg in the leadership debate rehearsals so convincingly that watching Tories said they’d vote for the Liberal Democrat leader. A government member who knows Hunt well says he is very knowledgeable on detail. “It’s difficult to catch him out. He’s also able to package things in a very understandable way. Detail and presentation together are a rare skill.”

At early meetings shortly after becoming culture secretary, witnesses say Hunt drove the agenda. One reports: “Hunt put it that we were going to focus on doing a set number of issues well. We were not going to diversify. We were going to make sure we kept our focus.”

The Olympics will certainly require plenty of attention. “There are always going to be ups and downs,” admits Hunt. One of the ‘downs’ was the large number of people who failed to get Olympics tickets. According to Lord Sebastian Coe, the London 2012 chairman, 1.9 million people applied for 22 million tickets − a demand he described as “unprecedented”.

Hunt explains: “I appreciate that inevitably with such a popular event there are going to be people who are disappointed they didn’t get tickets, although we are trying to do everything we can to sort that.”

A YouGov poll for The Daily Telegraph earlier this year found that there is a north–south divide in the UK over the perception of the benefits of the event to the British economy. Just 22 per cent of Scottish businesses believe the UK economy will benefits in 2012 from the Olympics, compared to 53 per cent in the south of England, including London.

Hunt is fully aware of the criticism of a London-centric Games: “It’s always been a worry for me. The Olympics has to be a project for the whole country. In terms of the economic legacy outside London, we have put together a package that will give the UK hopefully the best tourism marketing campaign in its history.” He nods to a £100m honeypot, funded by the private sector and the government, aimed at bringing an extra four million tourists to the UK in the four years following 2012. “That will create tens of thousands of jobs, and will be a real boost to the tourism industry.”

He also claims that the Games will extend outside of London, because of government plans for school games. So far 4,500 schools have signed up to an Olympic-style schools competition scheme. Hunt’s aim is to get half the schools in the country on board.

It’s not the only sporting legacy that Hunt shows enthusiasm for – another is the legacy for disability sport. He hopes that half of UK schools will be doing disability sport by next year, many for the first time. His first promotion, from 2005–07, under David Cameron, was to shadow disabilities minister. “I have always believed that 2012 is the year when, for many people in this country, the Paralympics will finally come of age. The first Paralympics happened in 1948 in Stoke Mandeville. We have a hugely strong Paralympic track record, but that’s not something that’s really been particularly visible in our schools. I want 2012 to be the year when we banish the idea of disabled children sitting on their own in the corner on the school’s sports day.”

He continues: “It’s possible for any school to have disability sport cheaply. It shouldn’t be a matter of money, just a question of imagination. It is also fantastic for non-disabled children to experience what it’s like actually to have a disability. There is a big social benefit.”

On the personal sporting front, Hunt has taken up football referee training. Does he understand the offside rule now? Well, he’s completed the theory part – “I got 31 out of 35” – now he’s got to complete the practical part. “That means reffing six matches,” he says. “I’m hoping I might ref a few matches in my constituency. You have to be really fit. I mean, the ref is, in terms of the amount of running around, about the fifth or sixth most active person on the pitch.” After dealing with the Murdochs, Sunday league footballers in Surrey will present a different but difficult challenge.

The cabinet minister is also a fan of Lambada dancing, which he describes as his “guilty pleasure”. Supposedly, he’s even got a specially sprung floor in his home to practise on, although he admits that his moves have “fallen by the wayside” since his son was born.

So, if he could compete in any Olympic sport, which would it be? “The 800 metres,” he replies. “I used to do cross-country running. I used to do better at the things that required a bit more stamina and less of a short sprint. I wasn’t particularly good at being quick off the mark.”

The Department of Culture, Media and Sport used to be known as the Ministry of Fun. Now one person working there suggests that, recently, it’s been “at times, the Ministry of Glum”. Hunt was the first minister to set out his spending commitment as part of the new government. He exceeded Treasury demands by identifying 50 per cent cuts in his department’s budget. This led to accusations that he was not fighting hard enough for his corner, but instead was more concerned with winning favour with Conservative top dogs.

He still talks a hard line on the deficit. “When I arrived in office, the big challenge was this massive need to sort out the deficit… Everything we do has to deal with the terribly difficult challenge of the deficit. It is a massive shadow over all activities that my department, and every other department, does. It’s been a challenge for the arts world, it’s been a challenge for the sports world.”

He claims, though, to have made the case for protecting the Olympics budget almost in its entirety – “and I’m very pleased to say the Chancellor listened”.

“The one budget in which I didn’t reduce a penny – in fact, I think it is the only budget across all the areas I am responsible for – is the budget that is being used to train our Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls,” he says. “The last thing I wanted in the run-up to 2012 is to do anything that could potentially demotivate them.”

The arts have been a strong focus of Hunt’s recent attention. The adornments of his office walls include an etching by Grayson Perry and an oil painting by Mark Wallinger. He recently launched a £55m endowment fund to encourage arts organisations to bid for public money to match the cash they get from private sources. It is part of his wider vision for philanthropy. “There is a lot of evidence that philanthropists are out there and want to support the arts, but what they need is recognition, which they haven’t always had before.”

He is keen to stress that the process of building up endowments will not change cultural funding overnight. “It took the Met in New York over 100 years to build up their $2bn endowment, and it’ll take our major cultural organisations some time, too. I want now to be when we say we don’t just deal with the short-term crisis, we deal with the long-term issue of financial resilience.”

On the same day that he announced the new endowment scheme, Nicholas Kent, the artistic director of the Tricycle theatre in Kilburn, London, declared that he was quitting over the battle to attract funding. He represents many complaints in the arts world.

Kent, who has been with the famous London theatre since 1984, told one paper: “If all art is based on an economic criteria, then this will be a very boring and unhealthy society”.

Hunt is unrepentant. “[Kent] had an 11 per cent cut in his budget, which is a lot less than many parts of the public sector,” he says, as we walk briskly to a photoshoot we have set up in his colleague Ed Vaizey’s office, “so I was puzzled that he thought the world was going to end as a result.” It’s tough love to the arts world from the culture secretary, a man who talks sweetly but who acts austerely. This approach is just one of the reasons why he’s been tipped as future leadership material.

As the photos are taken, it is impossible to ignore the golden gleam of Kevin Spacey’s Oscar statuette, resplendent in its own case – complete with a handwritten note – in the corner of Vaizey’s office.

Hunt’s tastes are more low-key, although he will be hoping to see gold for Britain in 2012. The BSkyB bid marks his most difficult period yet. And Hunt himself remains something of an unknown quantity. As one fan in Parliament says: “A criticism that MPs do make is: “What are his underpinning values?” They don’t know what he really stands for deep down. But he has plenty of time to develop that.” Although he may have missed out on Olympic tickets in the first round, his management of the event could show that he is all about success.

Tags: BSkyB, Jeremy Hunt, London 2012, Murdoch, News International, Olympics, Phone hacking