Newsnight News

The BBC's former deputy head of news Stephen Mitchell has resigned from his position following the Pollard Report, the corporation has confirmed.

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Nick Pollard has been speaking at a news conference following the publishing of his damning report into the BBC's handling of the Jimmy Savile investigation. Facing further questions, he told reporters:

• There were "serious problems" all the way through the Jimmy Savile investigation and subsequent crisis.
• He denied the crisis had shown the BBC was ungovernable.
• A "breakdown in communication" stopped Peter Rippon's blog being corrected swiftly, which went all the way to the director general.

• There exists no proof that Newsnight producer Meirion Jones leaked stories about the Savile story, despite staff at the BBC claiming he did. Mr Jones vehemently denies it.
• Trust of BBC journalism remains "very high" despite the crisis and "any fall is temporary".

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The BBC Trust also found that the Newsnight failures came in the immediate wake of the decision not to run an investigation in to Jimmy Savile and said that the situation had led to a "lack of clarity concerning who had overall editorial responsibility for the content of the Newsnight report".

They said: "Concern about possible reputational damage in that event 'played too large a part' in the decision to proceed with the broadcast."

"The Trustees were clear that there was a failure of editorial control within the BBC; this was a high-risk report which required rigorous supervision and did not receive it."

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The BBC Trust found that, although Lord McAlpine denied the allegations when he was contacted by a Channel 4 News journalist before Newsnight was broadcast, the BBC still made no attempt to contact the peer, which it should have done.

Trustees also said that concerns had been raised previously about the credibility of some of Mr Messham's evidence - which was known to members of BBC Wales, but no effort was made to contact them.

The Trustees considered that parts of BBC News not contacting colleagues in the nations and regions when investigating stories on their patch was very poor practice.

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The report from the BBC Trust's Editorial and Standards Committee said the failure by Newsnight was "extremely concerning".

It found that the freelance reporter Angus Stickler, who brought the story to Newsnight, was considered a "safe pair of hands" and may have been subjected to "lighter-touch editorial checks" than if he had been less well-known to the BBC.

It said the report was wrongly treated as if it had two sources, Steve Messham, and an interview with a second victim broadcast on BBC Five Live in 2000, who could not be contacted during the making of Newsnight.

The Trustees agreed that members of the Newsnight team were wrong to regard this as a report with two sources, given that the second witness could not be found.

The Trustees found it particularly concerning that, at no point in advance of the broadcast of the Newsnight report, was Mr Messham shown a photograph of Lord McAlpine and asked to confirm that he was the individual at the centre of the allegations.

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The BBC Trust has said that the airing of a Newsnight report which led to Lord McAlpine being wrongly named as a paedophile resulted largely from a failure by members of the team to follow the BBC's own editorial guidelines.

The broadcast on 2nd November was a "grave breach which had been costly to all concerned" and resulted in the public being misled, the Trust's Editorial Standards Committee (ESC) found

And in its findings, the committee ordered another report by the BBC next year into what steps will be taken to make sure the corporation "learns from these events".

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What happens now?

Well, the BBC says there will be a new editor for Newsnight and that they will strengthen the editorial and managerial systems.

Three people have been disciplined on the Newsnight McAlpine report but it is unclear what happens to others in the Pollard Report.

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On the blog that Peter Rippon wrote that turned out to be inaccurate, the report says its preparation was chaotic, that there were significant failings in the managerial oversight and "when clear leadership was required, it was not provided."

There is more criticism of George Entwistle who took a long time to take control of the issues. Stephen Mitchell signed off the blog.

And Helen Boaden texted Mr Rippon at the time saying "Excellent blog. You are a terrific writer x'.

The report is also critical of the failure to go to the police with the evidence Newsnight got.

When I doorstepped Mr Entwistle and Lord Patten, both insisted the BBC had gone straight to the police.

Pollard says he believes information should have been provided to the police.

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Perhaps the most startling information are emails sent to George Entwistle when he was BBC Director of Vision warning him before the Jimmy Savile tribute programmes were commissioned and aired that there was "a darker side of the story" about the presenter.

There was another email from a colleague in 2010, before Savile had died, telling Mr Entwistle: "I'd feel v queasy about an obit. I saw the real truth!!!"

The Pollard Report says this clearly raises questions for Mr Entwistle.

The email about the "darker side" of Savile shows "there was knowledge, not just rumour, within BBC Vision about the unsavoury side of Savile's character at the time the Christmas tribute programmes were planned."

And it says there were four opportunities for the BBC to look at whether the tribute programmes should have been commissioned and broadcast and they were all missed.

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