BBC chairman says no shake-up in the wake of Hutton

January 06, 2004

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BBC chairman says no shake-up in the wake of Hutton

LONDON – BBC chairman Gavyn Davies has said there will be no reform of how the corporation is run in the wake of the Hutton Inquiry into the death of MoD man Dr David Kelly.

In a report in the Financial Times this morning, Davies blamed government criticism of the BBC on an "aberration" in the Number 10 press office.

The Hutton Inquiry into the suicide of Dr Kelly is due to report later this month.

However, while Davies said the BBC would tighten editorial guidelines he dismissed the idea that there was a need for a speedy shake-up of the corporation.

The BBC chairman defended the BBC's system of self regulation and said that the sexing up of the weapons of mass destruction dossier was blown out of proportion by what he described as a "focused shorter term attack" on the BBC by the Downing Street press office.

"We believe our story was a legitimate story for the BBC to broadcast and we believe in protesting about parts of the story -- the Number 10 press office attacked the whole integrity of people in this organisation. I believe that was an aberration," Davies told the FT.

The pressure on the corporation to update its system of self regulation has intensified following the launch of the Hutton Report into the death of Dr David Kelly.

Dr Kelly committed suicide after he was implicated by BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan of accusing the government of "sexing up" its Iraqi dossier, which was used by Tony Blair's government to help back the case for the war in Iraq.

At the end of last year, the BBC's governors met to approve the changes to the compliance and complaints system at the corporation.

At the time, Davies again defended the role of the corporation's self-regulation system.

He said the 80-year-old governance system was in the public interest, although not necessarily politicians' or the BBC's commercial competitors'.

"The governors in September asked the director general and the executive committee to formulate proposals for reform in several key areas, including the producers' guidelines relating to the breaking of controversial stories and to the use of anonymous sources," he said.

"Some of these areas were related directly to the Kelly affair. Others were not. All of them merited a rethink."

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