Key Secretary Lisa Nandy said she remains confident in the leadership of the BBC, as the corporation is preparing to apologize for the way it edited a Donald Trump Spect.
Samir Shah, chairman of the corporation, was asked to apologize tomorrow for the edit, showing a panorama edition. The issue is a series of criticisms of the BBC made in a letter to its board by a former external adviser.
The culture of the Commons, the Culty and Sport Select Committee asked the BBC for its response to the issue Michael Price of Edhael Standerines in Editorial Standerines (EGSC). He left that role over the summer.
Nandy said he remains confident in Shah’s handling of the issue and Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, has yet to comment on the issue.
“I have complete confidence that both Samir Shah, the chair of the BBC, and Tim Davie will treat this with the seriousness that it demands,” he said. “I would like to see that response from the select committee, and, of course, consider it and have further conversations about what they are doing.
“There have been a series of serious allegations made, the most serious of which is that there is systematic bias in the way I told the BBC this week that he is taking it very seriously.”
He also warned that the BBC now operates in a world where viewers increasingly struggle to distinguish facts from political opinion.
“Increasingly, they’re operating in a news media environment where news and fact is often blurred with polemic and opinion, and I think that is creating a very, very dangerous environment in this country where people can’t trust what they see,” she told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg.
The edition of Panorama, broadcast a week before the US Election, combined clips of a Trump Consech held in the Capitol, and we will fight like hell. “
The words were taken from sections of his speech about an hour apart. The incident led to criticism of the BBC by Donald Trump’s press secretary, who described the corporation this week as “100% fake news” and a “propaganda machine”.
Prescott’s letter was passed on to the Daily Telegraph, which revealed its contents over the course of last week. It also includes accusations of bias in the way the BBC reports on Gaza and issues related to reform rights. It criticized BBC Arabic, stating that it has contributors who express antisemitic views.
Shah is expected to apologize for editing Trump. Other BBC figures have admitted it made mistakes.
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However, there is also concern within the BBC that the criticisms of Prescoth are used by its political opponents to prevent it at the right time, as it enters the best negotiations with the government in the future.
Some point to an effort to transfer politics to the BBC, dating Boris Johnson in government. The Guardian has been told by the man pushing for Price to be given an advisory role on the BBC board by Robbie GB who helped set up the controversial Broadcaster GB News.
Gibb was first put on the BBC board during Johnson’s time in government. Gibab and Prescott are reported to have been friends. Gibb was on a panel interviewing four people who taught at Prescott.
Johnson told the Guardian that any suggestion of an attempt to discredit the BBC was “complete and utter bollocks”. Prescott said in his letter that his criticisms “do not come from any political agenda”.
A BBC spokesman said: “[The editorial adviser roles] was advertised externally as part of the BBC’s open and fair competition process, and Michael Prescott was interviewed by a panel of board members who made the joint decision to appoint him. “