How we got here, in 200 wordspublished at 08:38 GMT
Two days have passed since the BBC’s director general Tim
Davie and head of news Deborah Turness resigned.
Pressure had been mounting on the corporation’s senior
leadership since the publication of a leaked memo last week, written by ex-BBC
adviser Michael Prescott.
Among a series of claims, Prescott accused Panorama of
airing a misleading edit of a speech made by Donald Trump on 6 January 2021.
On Monday, BBC chair Samir Shah apologised for Panorama’s
“error of judgement”, saying splicing parts of the speech
together “did give the impression of a direct call for violent
action”.
Soon after, US President Donald Trump threatened to sue the
BBC for $1bn – giving them until Friday to apologise and “appropriately
compensate” him.
The BBC has said it will respond in due course.
As we’ve been reporting, Davie is holding a staff call later
this morning. On Sunday, he said “some mistakes had been made” and
that he had to take “ultimate responsibility”.
Yesterday, Turness told journalists on her way into New
Broadcasting House – the BBC’s London headquarters – the “buck stops
with me”, but insisted that the BBC was “not institutionally
biased”.
Stay with us for rolling updates, reaction and analysis.
