How Lord Hutton's criticisms changed the direction of the BBC

0 Comments | Sunday Herald, The, Dec 26, 2004 | by Steven Vass

LORD Hutton's bristling attack on the BBC in his report into the death of weapons inspector Dr David Kelly kick-started what Mark Thompson later called the worst crisis in the corporation's 80-year history.

Hutton stunned observers by criticising the management and governors for failing to spot the weaknesses in Andrew Gilligan's infamous Today report and rushing to his defence without an investigation.

Gavyn Davies, the BBC chairman, quickly resigned. Director general Greg Dyke followed when it became clear he had lost the support of the governors, and Gilligan went soon after. So began several months of deep introspection at the corporation as doomsayers predicted disaster when the BBC charter was next up for renewal in 2007.

It also kicked off a wider debate about the integrity of journalism, with seemingly endless comment pieces, public discussions and books appearing on the subject.

Michael Grade took over as BBC chairman in May and appointed Thompson to be director general.

The ship steadied under these two BBC veterans and former Channel 4 chief executives, but it was increasingly clear that it was not the vessel it would have been under Dyke and Davies. After four years squaring up to commercial rivals and the government, the new rhetoric was all about getting back to public service basics and battening financial hatches.

In his inaugural speech in June, Thompson announced four major reviews into everything from programme commissioning to spending to the state of commercial arm BBC Worldwide.

This thickened the bewildering stew of BBC-related reviews already in motion: Ofcom, the communications regulator, was in the middle of its review of public service broadcasting;

and Lord Burns, chairman of Abbey, was reviewing the BBC charter on behalf of the government.

Queen Margaret Drive did not escape the winds of change, with the 12-year reign of John McCormick as controller of BBC Scotland coincidentally coming to an end in April.

Ken MacQuarrie, the Mull-born head of programmes who replaced him, has been overseeing the move to all-digital headquarters in Glasgow's Pacific Quay in 2007; negotiating Scotland's share of the changes in Thompson's reviews; and appoint staff to fill the gaps opened up by his promotion and de facto deputy controller, Colin Cameron's departue.

MacQuarrie chose Maggie Cunningham, head of radio, and Donalda MacKinnon, head of Gaelic and children's, to be his joint deputies under the title joint heads of programmes and services. Meanwhile Robert Smith, the BBC's governor for Scotland, is being replaced from next month by Jeremy Peat, who steps down from his role as chief economist of The Royal Bank of Scotland.

Back at UK level, the debate about journalistic integrity had died down by the autumn. In December, Thompson set out his review conclusions, and the plans for job cuts and rationalisation predictably hit the headlines.

There could be up to 5000 redundancies across the corporation which includes up to 200 in Scotland, and 15per cent budget cuts across output departments.

But while the unions gear up for battles in the New Year, there are also positive signs. The [pounds]320m savings target will all be reinvested in programming; the nation's share of network productions is to increase by [pounds]50m to 17per cent; there is to be a Glasgow- based commissioner for comedy and entertainment for the first time; and the entire children's, sport and new media departments are moving to Manchester.

The extent to which this will happen depends on both the governors' approval in the spring and the outcomes of the Ofcom and Burns reviews, due early in the year.

Telegraph changes hands

The Barclay brothers finally reached the national newspaper stage by buyinh the Telegraph group from disgraced Conrad Black's Hollinger group for 665 million. There was endless speculation that Andrew Neil, publisher of Scotsman Publications, would be surplus to requirements. The chief executive's job at the Telegraph Group duly went to Associate's Murdoch MacLennan, but Neil's remit was later extended to political magazine the Spectator

Musical Chairs

AT Scotsman Publications editorial director John McGurk replaced Iain Martin as Scotsman editor. Martin went to Scotland on Sunday, and John McLellan returned to edit the Edinburgh Evening News.

Richard Walker became editor of the Sunday Herald after Andrew Jaspan left to become editor-inchief of the Melbourne Age.

Piers Morgan was sacked from the Daily Mirror following hoax Iraqi torture pictures.

In TV, Sandy Ross left his post as head of STV and was replaced by Bobby Hain, while David Goode took over as chief of SRH from Richard Findlay.

Galloway triumph

GEORGE Galloway won his [pounds]150,000 libel case against the Daily Telegraph after the newspaper accused him of being in the pay of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in 2003. It was another failure for the "Reynolds" defence, which says that journalists can make alleg- ations in the public interest if they follow high standards of profess-ionalism, even if the facts later turn out to be untrue.