Wallace and groaner again…

Phil says: “This new ‘safeguarding policy’ is the least the BBC need to do. Heads should roll. After everything that has happened it is unbelievable!”. One Welsh former senior executive with the corporation has grave doubts that this will be enough, and told The Eye earlier: “The BBC is attempting to display decisiveness after the Huw Edwards & Savile scandals to help restore its public image. It’s cosmetic.  On the Wallace incident, it was said that we saw: “Another slap on the wrist from weak executives who’re afraid to sack talent & put ratings first. He’s finished and the Beeb managers who let him carry on should be fired”.

All of this comes on the back of many other appalling events where The BBC has hit the headlines for the wrong reasons, and would seem to endorse actions far greater than simply changing policy.

We have had the Amanda Abbington/Giovanni Pernice incident on ‘Strictly Come Dancing’, involving accusations of bullying and harassment. There has also been the the One Show and Match of the Day (MotD) presenter Jermaine Jenas, where once again there have been allegations of ‘inappropriate behaviour’, with reports claiming, for example, that one female member of staff received unsolicited communications via text from him. There has been the Gary Lineker business, the Huw Edwards affair (alluded to by BBC News), and the Jimmy Savile scandal (the full extent of which has only emerged relatively recently).

Mr Lineker had posted a tweet, apparently attacking the UK Government’s policy towards refugees, however his supporters (including Mr Jenas) proclaimed that this was from his personal account, and carpeting him undermined the concept of free speech.

He was then allowed back on air, but this apparent U-turn provoked a storm of criticism, and politicians as well as sports stars poked fun at the corporation over it. 

Some Tory MPs were furious at the decision to bring Mr Lineker back, saying that it gave him “carte blanche” to state what he liked on social media, despite Mr Davie insisting that he would “abide by the editorial guidelines”. An ‘independent review’ was to look into the use of social media by staff, although to critics this looked like meaningless twaddle to cover up the fact that managers had messed up.

Meanwhile it is now clear that Mr Savile had sexually abused hundreds of children and women at the height of his fame. It is believed he preyed on around 500 vulnerable victims as young as two years old at institutions including The BBC’s broadcasting studios, 14 hospitals and 20 children’s hospitals across England.

Obviously this abuse took place before The BBC Director General (DG) Tim Davie took over, but the extent of it has only come out recently so many insiders believe he has to take responsibility.

The more recent revelations came before the astonishing business about Edwards, which was very much with Mr Davie in position.  He was given a six month jail sentence, suspended for two years. Edwards had moving images of a child aged between seven and nine, and 41 photographs – seven category A images in levels of criminality, 12 category B pictures, and 22 category C. The category A images – the most serious kind – were mostly of children aged 13 to 15.

Yet Mr Davie thought they had done well. He defended his corporation’s handling of the controversy, when it paid Edwards hundreds of thousands of pounds even though it knew he had been arrested on child pornography charges.

But staff inside the organisation were distressed. One whistleblower said they were “disappointed” not to have heard more about an internal inquiry’s progress, a further critic said that it felt like “things have been swept under the carpet”.

In one announcement on Twitter/X Edwards highlighted (ironically):  “The wacky world where Wales was never a nation and Pembrokeshire is the heartland of… Plaid Cymru.  Help!”. The picture he attached underneath it, was of protesters carrying Welsh flags aloft with a placard of END LONDON RULE clearly visible near the centre of the photograph.

His remarks, though, were not met with wild acclaim by the leader of the Welsh Conservatives in the Welsh Parliament/Senedd Cymru (WP/SC) Andrew RT Davies, who has said on Twitter/X that The BBC was:  “Employing presenters who openly mock… (Britain)… Ridiculous!”, and linked it to the ‘Gutted’ post.

He ‘liked’ a tweet declaring that he should be “President of an Independent Cymru”, apparently flying in the face of the rules on impartiality (which Mr Davie has emphasised), and there was also a call on the internet for Edwards to be knighted because of his presentation of a Royal funeral.

He was merely ASKED to give some of it back. In a letter to staff the BBC Chair Samir Shah said that Edwards had “behaved in bad faith” (surely an under-statement!), saying that the corporation believed he had taken his salary despite knowing he was to plead guilty to the offences.

Edwards, formerly The BBC’s most high-profile newsreader, continued to earn his salary for FIVE months after he was arrested on three counts of making indecent images of children, during which time he was paid more than £200,000.

He was also accused of sending inappropriate messages to BBC employees (there are perhaps echoes here of what Mr Wallace is alleged to have done!). According to Newsnight, one current staff member claimed they were contacted on social media by him, and the messages left them feeling uncomfortable as well as awkward. The messages were reportedly suggestive in nature, appeared to be flirtatious, and referred to the appearance of Mr Edwards’ colleague. “There is a power dynamic that makes this inappropriate”, the staff member said. Another BBC employee alleged that Mr Edwards had also sent them a private message on social media which commented, too, on their appearance and gave them a “cold shudder”.

During the days in which Edwards went unnamed as the presenter at the centre of the scandal, the publicist and strategist Mark Berkowski told Times Radio: “We’ve got a situation where it’s an ongoing car crash and the BBC is so glacial about how they’re dealing with this, because this is a 21st century problem”.

But The BBC apparently thought it had done well. At a pre-arranged House of Lords (HoL) committee hearing, Mr Davie, said: “We have been in touch with the complainant”, and that due to the “history of this industry… we should all be concerned and appropriately diligent around the abuse of people in powerful positions”.

In that hearing he sat alongside the then acting chairwoman, Dame Elan Closs Stephen (who, like Edwards, is from Wales). She and Mr Davie were forced to answer important questions about the corporation’s attitude during the affair, following suggestions that it did not properly investigate the original complaint. Dame Elan told peers that despite “huge pressure” to name Edwards, the corporation “had a duty to act with some calm and rationality in the face of lack of rationality and lack of calm”. She was BBC chair for almost all of the period in question, and clearly she remains untarnished as one of the ‘great and good’ – she has been appointed to the Hay Festival.

There is also the incredible Jay Blades episode – again when Mr Davie was at the helm. The Repair Shop star was accused of illegal acts in relation to his estranged wife, with the allegations including physical and emotional abuse, according to court documents. He appeared at Kidderminster Magistrates’ Court and was bailed until another court appearance.

West Mercia Police (WMP) said he was charged after they were called to an address earlier in the year, following an Instagram post by Lisa Zbozen. A repeat of David & Jay’s Touring Toolshed was removed and The BBC will not show any programmes in which he features.

Removing programmes is unlikely to satisfy the personnel both inside and outside The BBC after all these scandals, even if a new ‘safeguarding policy’ is put in place…

The memories of Phil’s astonishing, decades long award-winning career in journalism (including his many years at the BBC) as he was gripped by the rare neurological disabling condition Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in a major book ‘A Good Story’. Order it now.

Tomorrow – how during those 23 years with The BBC, and in a 41 year journalistic career (when he was trained to use clear and simple language, avoiding jargon), for Phil spotting key trends and anachronisms early was crucial, and now this is highlighted by news that moves are underway today to change the honours system because references to the ‘Empire’ are seen as outdated in the modern world.