Ex-Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger has said Fleet Street titan Paul Dacre’s verbal attack on him at the Society of Editors’ conference was “terribly myopic” and that “some of it felt a bit Steve Bannon”.

Dacre dedicated much of his speech opening this year’s Society of Editors’ conference on Sunday to dismantling Rusbridger’s Guardian and his recently published book Breaking News.

The ex-Daily Mail editor said Rusbridger had reduced the newspaper to an “economic basket case” while editor, which he described as “a textbook case for journalism schools on how not to do things” in his speech on 4 November in Manchester.