In 1995 Panorama got a scoop its rivals the world over wanted. It changed history. Now an independent inquiry for the BBC has found that reporter Martin Bashir used forgeries to get the interview, deceiving Princess Diana and her brother. Martin Bashir spun a web of elaborate lies to win the trust of the Princess. For 25 years the BBC defended its global scoop but now stands accused of a failure of integrity. Martin Bashir’s reputation lies in ruins described by the Inquiry as dishonest and devious. Panorama: Princess Diana, Martin Bashir and the BBC, BBC 2021
The BBC sports department when I was there was seriously to the right of Genghis Khan, and if people think I am strange, they should have met some of the production staff I worked with. Margaret Thatcher and the Queen were the pin-up girls for many of them. David Icke
I’ve been told by the BBC that if I make one more offensive remark, anywhere, at any time, I will be sacked. And even the angel Gabriel would struggle to survive with that hanging over his head. It’s inevitable that one day, someone, somewhere will say that I’ve offended them, and that will be that. Jeremy Clarkson
I did six series for the BBC and that was enough. I’ve been writing for ten years, which is more challenging artistically. Alexei Sayle
I exist as an annexe of the BBC. I’m down the road a bit from the main building, in a little hut. Alexei Sayle
Hair is also a problem. I remember once, when I was reporting from Beirut at the height of the civil war, someone wrote in to the BBC complaining about my appearance. Kate Adie
The BBC will always be attacked by whoever is in government. It is that George Bush thing of ‘If you’re not with us you are against us’. Graham Norton
It was sad leaving the BBC; not quite like being divorced, but you don’t leave after a period stretching from 1960 to 1999 without feeling a certain number of pangs. Richie Benaud
Until the BBC acknowledge that was a lie I will keep banging on. Alistair Campbell, prime minister’s spokesman 1997-2003
Outside Broadcasting House the demonstrators pressed closer to the entrance, pushing back the wooden barriers that the BBC security men had placed in front of the doors. A crowd of some two hundred protesters had now formed, listening on their radios to a news programme that discussed the events unfolding below the BBC’s windows. J G Ballard, Millennium People p154
Five minutes later it was all over. As the riot police manhandled us through the lobby we learned that the assault on The World Today had failed. Long before our arrival, the entire production team had moved to a secure studio in the basement. The police snatch squads had entered Broadcasting House through a side door in Portland Place. They were waiting for us, truncheons warm and at the ready, and made short work of any protesters lost in the mazelike corridors. We were roughly rounded up and ejected from the building, and the Corporation resumed its historic task of beguiling the middle classes. ibid. p156
Widespread fears that the BBC is losing its independence and becoming a state broadcasting corporation. World in Action: The Taming of the Beeb, ITV 1988
Politicians of all parties hated the BBC’s new irreverent approach none more so than the new Labour prime minister Harold Wilson; he came to believe the BBC was deeply biased against him. ibid.
Mrs Thatcher has been determined to be the BBC’s housekeeper. ibid.
The BBC’s boxing schedule is built around Astaire and Duff promotions without even knowing who is boxing. Dispatches: The Fight Game, Channel 4 1993
Even amongst the public long used to BBC corruption, waste and scandal the recent controversy regarding the BBC’s cover-up of the activities of former BBC presenter Sir James Wilson Vincent Jimmy Savile has managed to outrage even the broadcaster’s staunchest proponents. The Corbett Report: The BBC Exposed, James Corbett online
Speaks to the absolute rot at the core of the British political and media establishment. ibid.
The worst crisis to hit the corporation in fifty years. ibid.
He was simply seen as a friend of the establishment. ibid. Edwina Currie
BBC Bombast: Propaganda, Complaints and Black Holes of Silence. ibid. Media Lens online article July 2011 re BBC’s complicity with bombing of Libya
The dramatic packaging allows propaganda to slip through in digestible chunks. ibid. Media Lens
It admits it is partial on certain issues. ibid. Corbett
TwentyeightGate: The Secret 28 [Scientists] Who Made BBC Green Will Not Be Named: The BBC pits six lawyers against one questioning blogger. ibid. online report November 2012
The BBC was sitting on the Climategate documents for several weeks before they were leaked on the Internet. ibid. Corbett
‘It is a British unionist institution; its Britishness is the norm and its Scottishness is the aberration.’ London Calling, 2015, critic, 2015
‘Wow! The usual impartiality of the British Brainwashing Corporation at its best.’ ibid. Alex Salmond in response to BBC presenter’s question
2014: ‘Today there have been further warnings about the possible negative consequences of Scottish independence.’ ibid.
2012: BBC headlines: Scottish independence, pensions shortfall warning … I found eighteen examples of a BBC headline that combined the words independence and warning. ibid. Craig Murray
‘Pumped out all day again and again.’ ibid.
‘This MP’s idea that there will be some quick fix and that an independent Scotland can just rejoin NATO without any difficulties is fanciful.’ ibid. Jim Murphy
‘… to see the horrendous bias that went on against the Yes campaign before the referendum – to see the BBC used as a political cudgel against a legitimate democratic movement – really broke my heart.’ ibid. Peter Mullen
‘It was a form of anti-Scottish racism.’ ibid. critic #1
Repeated allegations of bias against the broadcaster made by senior officials in both Tehran and Whitehall. Document: BBC Bias and the Iranian Revolution, BBC Radio 4 2009
Papers I’ve come across which raise doubts about the role of the BBC in the late 1970s when Iran was teetering on the brink of revolution. ibid.
The growing threat to the Shah was endangering British interests. ibid.
His [Orwell’s] BBC Office was Room 101. George Orwell: A Life in Pictures, BBC 2003
The BBC has been wrestling with a scandal which casts a long shadow over its reputation for honesty and transparency. A film on Channel 4 just over a month ago showed how the most famous piece of television ever broadcast by the BBC involved deception and the use of forged documents. The Diana Interview: The Truth Behind the Scandal, Channel 4 2020
How Martin Bashir devised a scheme to get him an introduction to Princess Diana, the first step to persuading her to give him an interview. He commissioned two forged bank statements. ibid.
So how did BBC managements know about what their reporter had been up to? ibid.
‘An extraordinary story of Walter Mittyish behaviour.’ ibid. Andrew Morton
The BBC needed to keep what they were doing secret from Buckingham Palace. ibid.
BBC: Most programmes were shot live in a studio on big Emitron cameras that cost £10,000 each … The BBC could only afford four of them … To ensure audiences weren’t subjected to blank silent screens, they were instead treated to Interludes: comfortingly sedate short films made simply to fill time, accompanied by quintessentially English divertimenti, which swishing harps and cascading violins that recalled the pastoral warmth of Vaughan Williams. Top of the Interlude charts was The Potter’s Wheel. The Sound of TV with Neil Bland II: Advertising & Jingles, BBC 2020
Hong Kong: The BBC continued the fantasy of the special virtues of the Britain’s empire … ‘There’s a genuine fondness for Britain’s decent contribution here.’ Adam Curtis, Can’t Get You Out of My Head V: The Lordly Ones ***** BBC 2021
After 1971 Savile would go on to abuse at least ten victims in connection with his work at Top of the Pops. Six of those abused were children. Savile: Portrait of a Predator, caption, source the Dame Janet Smith Review Report 2016, ITV 2021
Savile’s Travels: Savile took his mobile home on tour. ibid.
BBC was the first television network in this country to go into colour. David Attenborough, interview BBC, viz Civilisation Extra & Ascent of Man Extra
I was very keen that K Clark should appear in vision ... There is nothing more captivating than an informed talking head. People had Civilisation parties. ibid.
The success of the series within the BBC, within the television community, and the BBC in particularly, had a great effect really, because that kind of large-scale documentary had not been done before. ibid.
One of the reasons for resigning was in order to be able to do a successor which was eventually a series called Life on Earth. ibid.
Bruno [Jacob Bronowski] was one of the big stars of the Brains Trust. ibid.
An average documentary takes about three months to do. ibid.
The Ascent of Man ... This was a vision of human progress, the progress of human knowledge, which he had wanted to share. ibid.