Rebekah Brooks's secretary denied allegations that the former News International chief executive tried to help her get a fresh start in Australia as "payment in kind" for helping to remove seven boxes of notebooks and other material from the company archive.

Cheryl Carter also categorically denied to police that she had tried to obstruct the course of justice on behalf of her former boss by concealing boxes from Scotland Yard investigators in the wake of the closure of the News of the World in July 2011, the Old Bailey heard on Wednesday.

In an interview in January 2012, Carter told Detective Sergeant John Massey there was "no substance" in any of the allegations.

He asked her whether she thought the removal of the seven boxes and the decision to take them home "might be interpreted as being suspicious or dangerous or illegal or criminal in some way". Carter replied "No."

In the interview read out to the jury in the hacking trial at the Old Bailey, Massey then put it to her: "You didn't think that taking possession of seven boxes marked up as 'Rebekah Brooks' the day after the paper had announced that it was closing, and then getting rid of them, was something that would put you in a very difficult position."

Carter replied: "No, because I knew they were mine, so I knew that I was going to return anything, which I did, that was hers … because in my mind, I wasn't doing anything wrong."

The jury heard on Tuesday that the Carter family had contemplated emigrating to Australia as far back as 2003 and had got visas to allow legal entry in 2007 which would last five years.

When she was arrested on 6 January 2012, Carter and her family had tickets to move to Australia permanently two weeks later.

DC Massey put it to her that this could be seen as suspicious."The subsequent decision by yourself and your family to move to Australia, with some employment, initiated and assisted in some way by Rebekah Brooks of News International … that again there is nothing suspicious in that?"

Carter said this was not true as she wanted to launch her makeup business. "No, because I don't really want to work for the paper [in Australia], I need a job, I have lost my livelihood," she told police.

"I want to do my makeup [business], so if they turn around or whatever and say 'you are not working there' that is fine, I want to do my makeup out there."

DC Massey then said: "So that is not a payment in kind for you having dutifully got rid of some property that could have caused serious difficulties in the police investigation?"

Carter replied: "100% no, on my children's life. No. Absolutely not. That is not what I am about."

On Tuesday the jury heard that Carter had phoned the News International archivist, Nick Mays, requesting the return of seven boxes that contained notebooks and some personal effects belonging to Brooks.

Carter had said she had initially got a call from the archivist in April 2011 requesting her to collect the boxes because the company wanted to downsize its archive. Mays told police he did not make this call and had no instruction to downsize the archive, the jury heard.

The jury heard that Carter had told police the boxes contained 30 notebooks belonging to her, some cuttings relating to her beauty column in the Sun and some memorabilia, plus three notepads belonging to Brooks that she returned to the News International office.

The jury also heard on Tuesday that the police had alleged that Carter was planning a fresh start in Australia and this may have been a "reward" for concealing the boxes.

She was asked by police in her final interview if it was true that Brooks had helped her to find a new job in Australia in one of Rupert Murdoch's papers.

"Yes, she spoke to [former News Ltd chief executive] John Hartigan, who is in charge of some of the Australian papers. I do not know what she said but when I went there, they said 'Look, you know, you can start as a general secretary if you want to'," Carter said.

She said the job had a salary of £30,000, less than half the £66,000 salary she was on when acting as executive assistant to Brooks in her role as chief executive officer of News International.

Carter told police there was no firm offer and she intended to emigrate to Australia with her family and hoped to launch her own range of cosmetics in the country. She already had a range, Famous, carried by Superdrug in the UK and she had been offered a chance to launch these there with her husband Jeff.

"They have not offered me … the best thing they said is that I can start as a junior secretary if I want and work my way up. But like I say I was going to do the makeup out there, that was mine and Jeff's intention to try and get the brands into Australia and build a business out there," said Carter.

She repeated to the police that she had returned all the material that related to Brooks to the office and the police could have seen that when they sealed and searched her office following the executive's resignation.

"Anything, that was remotely [to do with] Rebekah Brooks went back to News International and the police could have looked at," Carter replied.

Carter and Brooks have been charged with conspiring to pervert the course of justice by concealing seven boxes from officers investigating phone hacking.

They both deny the charge.

The trial continues.