Photo: EPA
British MPs consider unreasonable the 450,000 pounds payout to BBC Director General George Entwistle who stepped down last Saturday due to a scandal about the Newsnight programme in which well-known politician Lord Alistair McAlpine was wrongly accused of pedophilia.
John Whittingdale, the head of the Conservative faction in Parliament, asked the BBC Board of Trustees to explain why they found this size of payout reasonable. This request was supported by Harriet Harman, Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. BBC director of news and deputy step aside The two most senior figures at BBC News stepped aside on Monday a day after the chairman of the broadcaster's governing body said it needed a radical overhaul to survive a child sex abuse scandal, it said. Helen Boaden, the director of BBC News, and her deputy Steve Mitchell, stepped aside two days after the director general quit to take the blame for the airing of false child sex abuse allegations against a former politician. The BBC's press office said it could not yet confirm the news but the BBC said on its news website that there would be an announcement later in the day. The development is the latest blow to the corporation, which has been thrown into turmoil by revelations about a historic child sex abuse scandal and the broadcaster's problems with reporting the issue. George Entwistle resigned as general director on Saturday, just two months into the job, to take responsibility for a report aired by the flagship Newsnight programme which wrongly accused a former politician of also being involved in child abuse. Chris Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, said on Sunday that he would work quickly to find a replacement for Entwistle while leading a radical overhaul of the corporation. BBC Chief Entwistle’s paycheck rises doubts among UK media officials The BBC Trust on Sunday approved a £450,000 pay-off for Mr Entwistle, equal to a full year’s salary, saying it reflected the fact that he would “continue to help on BBC business”, including two inquiries into the Savile affair. John Whittingdale, chairman of the Commons culture, media and sport committee, said he wanted an explanation of the payment. “A lot of people will be very surprised that somebody who was in the job for such a short period of time and then had to leave in these circumstances should be walking away with £450,000 of licence fee payers’ money,” he told the Press Association. Lord Patten, the former chairman of the Conservative party, said he would not respond to calls for his resignation that had appeared in some Sunday newspapers. “I think my job is to make sure that we now learn the lessons from the crisis,” he said. “If I don’t do that and don’t restore huge confidence and trust in the BBC then I’m sure people will tell me to take my cards and clear off,” he said. “But I will not take my marching orders from Mr Murdoch’s newspapers.” 'BBC must reform or face uncertain future' (VIDEO) Britain's BBC must undergo a radical overhaul in the wake of "shoddy" journalism which led to the resignation of its chief or its future will be in doubt, the head of the state-funded broadcaster's governing body said on Sunday. Chris Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, said opponents of the BBC, especially Rupert Murdoch's media empire, would take advantage of the turmoil to up the pressure on its long-term rival. "If you're saying, does the BBC need a thorough structural radical overhaul, then absolutely it does and that is what we will have to do," Patten, a one-time senior figure in Prime Minister David Cameron's Conservative Party and the last British governor of Hong Kong, told BBC TV. BBC Director General George Entwistle resigned late on Saturday just two months into the job, after the corporation's flagship news programme aired mistaken allegations of child sex abuse against a former leading politician. Already under pressure after revelations that a long-time star presenter had been a paedophile, Entwistle quit saying the unacceptable standards of the Newsnight report had damaged the public's confidence in the 90-year-old BBC. "As the director general of the BBC, I am ultimately responsible for all content as the editor-in-chief, and I have therefore decided that the honourable thing for me to do is to step down," he said. Patten joined critics who said a complex hierarchical management structure at the BBC was partly to blame. One of the BBC's most prominent journalists Jeremy Paxman, a Newsnight presenter, said in recent years, management had become bloated while cash was cut from programme budgets. "He (Entwistle) has been brought low by cowards and incompetents," Paxman said in a statement. Patten, in charge of finding a successor to sort out the turmoil at an institution affectionately known as "Auntie", said changes needed to be made after describing the Newsnight journalism as "shoddy". BBC director of news and deputy step aside The two most senior figures at BBC News stepped aside on Monday a day after the chairman of the broadcaster's governing body said it needed a radical overhaul to survive a child sex abuse scandal, it said. Helen Boaden, the director of BBC News, and her deputy Steve Mitchell, stepped aside two days after the director general quit to take the blame for the airing of false child sex abuse allegations against a former politician. The BBC's press office said it could not yet confirm the news but the BBC said on its news website that there would be an announcement later in the day. The development is the latest blow to the corporation, which has been thrown into turmoil by revelations about a historic child sex abuse scandal and the broadcaster's problems with reporting the issue. George Entwistle resigned as general director on Saturday, just two months into the job, to take responsibility for a report aired by the flagship Newsnight programme which wrongly accused a former politician of also being involved in child abuse. Chris Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, said on Sunday that he would work quickly to find a replacement for Entwistle while leading a radical overhaul of the corporation. BBC Director-General resigns over misguided Newsnight broadcast In a statement Mr Entwistle said: "I have decided that the honourable thing to do is to step down." Earlier, Mr Entwistle said the BBC Television program Newsnight, which wrongly implicated a former conservative politician, Lord McAlpine, in a child sex abuse scandal, should never have been broadcast. The program covered cases of child abuse at North Wales child care homes. Mr Entwistle took up the post of director general on 17 September. In his statement, Mr Entwistle, who was appointed to the post less than two months ago, said: "In the light of the fact that the director general is also the editor in chief and ultimately responsible for all content, and in the light of the unacceptable journalistic standards of the Newsnight film broadcast on Friday 2 November, I have decided that the honourable thing to do is to step down from the post of director general." The offending Newsnight program came on the heels of the Jimmy Savile crisis, which was erupted after Newsnight had shelved an earlier investigation into allegations of child abuse. In October at a parliamentary hearing Mr Entwistle was accused by MPs of showing "an extraordinary lack of curiosity" over the Jimmy Savile affair and was told to "get a grip". The BBC still faces very serious questions, not just about its journalism but about how the organisation is run. BBC leader resigns in wake of scandal BBC Director General George Entwistle has stepped down over a scandal connected with Lord Alistair McAlpine, falsely suspected by the company of being involved in pedophilia in the 1980s. This was reported by the BBC on Sunday night. "I have decided the honorable thing is to step down from the post," - said the journalist. Entwistle was appointed Director General of the BBC on September 17, 2012, only to resign 54 days later in the wake of the biggest scandal in the history of the information group. The scandal, which began with allegations against a single former BBC employee, has since engulfed hospitals, children’s homes, even the police. It also poses questions for Mark Thompson, Entwistle's immediate predecessor, who on Monday becomes chief executive of The New York Times. For an entire week, one of the BBC's key news shows suggested a leading Conservative party politician, who wasn’t named, had been involved in the rape of a young boy in Wales decades ago. The man accused denied it; the victim himself now says it was a case of mistaken identity. Many networks ran interviews with the victim - one even asked whether a pedophile network had been protected by a masonic conspiracy. Did a judge who led an early inquiry into the abuse at a North Wales children’s home deliberately hide the names of famous or influential abusers? In front of one million television viewers, a morning TV host handed a list of alleged pedophiles to the British Prime Minister David Cameron live on air. That list, allegedly including the names of other senior politicians, was compiled based on unsubstantiated Internet rumors. The revelation that all of this was a mistake is once again causing Britain's media organizations to question their own values, only months after news of newspaper phone-hacking. It has filled Britain with outrage, astonishment and self-doubt. The scandal had begun with separate claims that BBC - one of the most respected brands in journalism worldwide - had failed to expose the late BBC children's television personality and fundraiser, Jimmy Savile, as a pedophile even though it had interviewed several victims who made allegations against the star. It’s now clear those allegations are well founded. Yet the same BBC program, 'Newsnight', that shelved the original and apparently accurate Savile story was the first to broadcast the latest false allegations. 'Newsnight' has apologized on air for its mistake, another inquiry has been launched, and the program has temporarily suspended all its investigatory work. On Saturday, Entwistle, who took his post in September, resigned in response to the growing scandal after a humiliating interviewon the BBC’s own flagship radio news program, 'Today'. The BBC is in crisis. Entwistle only succeeded Mark Thompson, set to take over as chief executive of the New York Times Co, in September and almost immediately faced one of the biggest crises in the history of the BBC, funded by a licence fee paid by TV viewers. This was the revelation by rival broadcaster ITV that the late Jimmy Savile, one of the most recognisable personalities on British television in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, had sexually abused young girls, some on BBC premises. Suggestions then surfaced of a paedophile ring inside the BBC at the time, and a cover-up. Police have launched an inquiry and detectives said they had arrested their third suspect on Sunday, a man in his 70s from Cambridgeshire in central England. Entwistle was condemned for the BBC's slow response to the Savile furore and then lambasted after it emerged that Newsnight had axed a planned expose into Savile shortly after his death and that the broadcaster had gone ahead with tributes instead. His appearance before a parliamentary committee provoked mockery, with one lawmaker saying he had shown a "lamentable lack of knowledge" of what was going on at his own organisation. Thompson has also faced questions from staff at the New York Times over whether he is still the right person to take one of the biggest jobs in American newspaper publishing. The knives were out for Entwistle on Friday after the BBC apologised for the mistaken allegation that an ex-politician, later identified on the Internet as a close ally of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, had abused children, and had not asked him for a comment before broadcast. The last straw came when Entwistle was forced to admit on BBC radio that he had not been told about the Newsnight report before it aired nor known - or asked - who the alleged abuser was until the name appeared in social media. Voice of Russia, Reuters, RIA, Source: Voice of Russia
John Whittingdale, the head of the Conservative faction in Parliament, asked the BBC Board of Trustees to explain why they found this size of payout reasonable. This request was supported by Harriet Harman, Deputy Leader of the Labour Party. BBC director of news and deputy step aside The two most senior figures at BBC News stepped aside on Monday a day after the chairman of the broadcaster's governing body said it needed a radical overhaul to survive a child sex abuse scandal, it said. Helen Boaden, the director of BBC News, and her deputy Steve Mitchell, stepped aside two days after the director general quit to take the blame for the airing of false child sex abuse allegations against a former politician. The BBC's press office said it could not yet confirm the news but the BBC said on its news website that there would be an announcement later in the day. The development is the latest blow to the corporation, which has been thrown into turmoil by revelations about a historic child sex abuse scandal and the broadcaster's problems with reporting the issue. George Entwistle resigned as general director on Saturday, just two months into the job, to take responsibility for a report aired by the flagship Newsnight programme which wrongly accused a former politician of also being involved in child abuse. Chris Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, said on Sunday that he would work quickly to find a replacement for Entwistle while leading a radical overhaul of the corporation. BBC Chief Entwistle’s paycheck rises doubts among UK media officials The BBC Trust on Sunday approved a £450,000 pay-off for Mr Entwistle, equal to a full year’s salary, saying it reflected the fact that he would “continue to help on BBC business”, including two inquiries into the Savile affair. John Whittingdale, chairman of the Commons culture, media and sport committee, said he wanted an explanation of the payment. “A lot of people will be very surprised that somebody who was in the job for such a short period of time and then had to leave in these circumstances should be walking away with £450,000 of licence fee payers’ money,” he told the Press Association. Lord Patten, the former chairman of the Conservative party, said he would not respond to calls for his resignation that had appeared in some Sunday newspapers. “I think my job is to make sure that we now learn the lessons from the crisis,” he said. “If I don’t do that and don’t restore huge confidence and trust in the BBC then I’m sure people will tell me to take my cards and clear off,” he said. “But I will not take my marching orders from Mr Murdoch’s newspapers.” 'BBC must reform or face uncertain future' (VIDEO) Britain's BBC must undergo a radical overhaul in the wake of "shoddy" journalism which led to the resignation of its chief or its future will be in doubt, the head of the state-funded broadcaster's governing body said on Sunday. Chris Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, said opponents of the BBC, especially Rupert Murdoch's media empire, would take advantage of the turmoil to up the pressure on its long-term rival. "If you're saying, does the BBC need a thorough structural radical overhaul, then absolutely it does and that is what we will have to do," Patten, a one-time senior figure in Prime Minister David Cameron's Conservative Party and the last British governor of Hong Kong, told BBC TV. BBC Director General George Entwistle resigned late on Saturday just two months into the job, after the corporation's flagship news programme aired mistaken allegations of child sex abuse against a former leading politician. Already under pressure after revelations that a long-time star presenter had been a paedophile, Entwistle quit saying the unacceptable standards of the Newsnight report had damaged the public's confidence in the 90-year-old BBC. "As the director general of the BBC, I am ultimately responsible for all content as the editor-in-chief, and I have therefore decided that the honourable thing for me to do is to step down," he said. Patten joined critics who said a complex hierarchical management structure at the BBC was partly to blame. One of the BBC's most prominent journalists Jeremy Paxman, a Newsnight presenter, said in recent years, management had become bloated while cash was cut from programme budgets. "He (Entwistle) has been brought low by cowards and incompetents," Paxman said in a statement. Patten, in charge of finding a successor to sort out the turmoil at an institution affectionately known as "Auntie", said changes needed to be made after describing the Newsnight journalism as "shoddy". BBC director of news and deputy step aside The two most senior figures at BBC News stepped aside on Monday a day after the chairman of the broadcaster's governing body said it needed a radical overhaul to survive a child sex abuse scandal, it said. Helen Boaden, the director of BBC News, and her deputy Steve Mitchell, stepped aside two days after the director general quit to take the blame for the airing of false child sex abuse allegations against a former politician. The BBC's press office said it could not yet confirm the news but the BBC said on its news website that there would be an announcement later in the day. The development is the latest blow to the corporation, which has been thrown into turmoil by revelations about a historic child sex abuse scandal and the broadcaster's problems with reporting the issue. George Entwistle resigned as general director on Saturday, just two months into the job, to take responsibility for a report aired by the flagship Newsnight programme which wrongly accused a former politician of also being involved in child abuse. Chris Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, said on Sunday that he would work quickly to find a replacement for Entwistle while leading a radical overhaul of the corporation. BBC Director-General resigns over misguided Newsnight broadcast In a statement Mr Entwistle said: "I have decided that the honourable thing to do is to step down." Earlier, Mr Entwistle said the BBC Television program Newsnight, which wrongly implicated a former conservative politician, Lord McAlpine, in a child sex abuse scandal, should never have been broadcast. The program covered cases of child abuse at North Wales child care homes. Mr Entwistle took up the post of director general on 17 September. In his statement, Mr Entwistle, who was appointed to the post less than two months ago, said: "In the light of the fact that the director general is also the editor in chief and ultimately responsible for all content, and in the light of the unacceptable journalistic standards of the Newsnight film broadcast on Friday 2 November, I have decided that the honourable thing to do is to step down from the post of director general." The offending Newsnight program came on the heels of the Jimmy Savile crisis, which was erupted after Newsnight had shelved an earlier investigation into allegations of child abuse. In October at a parliamentary hearing Mr Entwistle was accused by MPs of showing "an extraordinary lack of curiosity" over the Jimmy Savile affair and was told to "get a grip". The BBC still faces very serious questions, not just about its journalism but about how the organisation is run. BBC leader resigns in wake of scandal BBC Director General George Entwistle has stepped down over a scandal connected with Lord Alistair McAlpine, falsely suspected by the company of being involved in pedophilia in the 1980s. This was reported by the BBC on Sunday night. "I have decided the honorable thing is to step down from the post," - said the journalist. Entwistle was appointed Director General of the BBC on September 17, 2012, only to resign 54 days later in the wake of the biggest scandal in the history of the information group. The scandal, which began with allegations against a single former BBC employee, has since engulfed hospitals, children’s homes, even the police. It also poses questions for Mark Thompson, Entwistle's immediate predecessor, who on Monday becomes chief executive of The New York Times. For an entire week, one of the BBC's key news shows suggested a leading Conservative party politician, who wasn’t named, had been involved in the rape of a young boy in Wales decades ago. The man accused denied it; the victim himself now says it was a case of mistaken identity. Many networks ran interviews with the victim - one even asked whether a pedophile network had been protected by a masonic conspiracy. Did a judge who led an early inquiry into the abuse at a North Wales children’s home deliberately hide the names of famous or influential abusers? In front of one million television viewers, a morning TV host handed a list of alleged pedophiles to the British Prime Minister David Cameron live on air. That list, allegedly including the names of other senior politicians, was compiled based on unsubstantiated Internet rumors. The revelation that all of this was a mistake is once again causing Britain's media organizations to question their own values, only months after news of newspaper phone-hacking. It has filled Britain with outrage, astonishment and self-doubt. The scandal had begun with separate claims that BBC - one of the most respected brands in journalism worldwide - had failed to expose the late BBC children's television personality and fundraiser, Jimmy Savile, as a pedophile even though it had interviewed several victims who made allegations against the star. It’s now clear those allegations are well founded. Yet the same BBC program, 'Newsnight', that shelved the original and apparently accurate Savile story was the first to broadcast the latest false allegations. 'Newsnight' has apologized on air for its mistake, another inquiry has been launched, and the program has temporarily suspended all its investigatory work. On Saturday, Entwistle, who took his post in September, resigned in response to the growing scandal after a humiliating interviewon the BBC’s own flagship radio news program, 'Today'. The BBC is in crisis. Entwistle only succeeded Mark Thompson, set to take over as chief executive of the New York Times Co, in September and almost immediately faced one of the biggest crises in the history of the BBC, funded by a licence fee paid by TV viewers. This was the revelation by rival broadcaster ITV that the late Jimmy Savile, one of the most recognisable personalities on British television in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, had sexually abused young girls, some on BBC premises. Suggestions then surfaced of a paedophile ring inside the BBC at the time, and a cover-up. Police have launched an inquiry and detectives said they had arrested their third suspect on Sunday, a man in his 70s from Cambridgeshire in central England. Entwistle was condemned for the BBC's slow response to the Savile furore and then lambasted after it emerged that Newsnight had axed a planned expose into Savile shortly after his death and that the broadcaster had gone ahead with tributes instead. His appearance before a parliamentary committee provoked mockery, with one lawmaker saying he had shown a "lamentable lack of knowledge" of what was going on at his own organisation. Thompson has also faced questions from staff at the New York Times over whether he is still the right person to take one of the biggest jobs in American newspaper publishing. The knives were out for Entwistle on Friday after the BBC apologised for the mistaken allegation that an ex-politician, later identified on the Internet as a close ally of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, had abused children, and had not asked him for a comment before broadcast. The last straw came when Entwistle was forced to admit on BBC radio that he had not been told about the Newsnight report before it aired nor known - or asked - who the alleged abuser was until the name appeared in social media. Voice of Russia, Reuters, RIA, Source: Voice of Russia
