Blair signals truce as BBC boss bites bullet
Prime Minister Tony Blair welcomed the apology and said the government could now “draw a line” under the whole episode.
His ex-communications director Alastair Campbell, the most tenacious critic of the BBC, also said he now accepted the affair was over, telling Five News: “I’m sad that it’s taken all this to get a situation where these allegations have finally been withdrawn.”
Lord Ryder’s apology, delivered on TV as the corporation’s acting chairman, was the final act of compliance from the corporation the government had been waiting for since Lord Hutton yesterday published his report into Dr Kelly’s death.
It found Mr Gilligan’s Today programme claims that No 10 had “sexed up” its dossier on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction were “unfounded” and cleared ministers from Mr Blair down of any impropriety concerning events leading up to weapons expert Dr Kelly’s suicide. He had been the source of Mr Gilligan’s broadcast.
Greg Dyke resigned yesterday afternoon as BBC director general, joining ex-chairman Gavyn Davies in quitting the corporation in the wake of the Hutton Report, which was scathing in its criticism of the corporation’s editorial and management systems.
Mr Blair’s official spokesman said: “They decided to resign and the Prime Minister believes that two decent and honourable men have done the decent and honourable thing and it is time, as he said, to move on.”
Mr Dyke announced he was resigning in an attempt to “draw a line under this episode”.
He added: “Throughout this affair my sole aim as director general of the BBC has been to defend our editorial independence and to act in the public interest.”
Minutes later, acting chairman Lord Ryder issued the apology Downing Street had demanded earlier in the day, turning the screw on the beleaguered corporation.
He said: “On behalf of the BBC, I have no hesitation in apologising unreservedly for our errors.”
Mr Blair immediately welcomed the BBC’s apology, saying: “This for me has always been a very simple matter of an accusation that was a very serious one that was made. It has now been withdrawn, that is all I ever wanted.”
He added: “I want to make it absolutely clear I fully respect the independence of the BBC.
“I have no doubt that the BBC will continue, as it should do, to probe and question the Government in every proper way. What this does now is allow us to draw a line and move on.”
But there was a growing backlash from supporters of the BBC, claiming Lord Hutton’s report had been a “whitewash”.
About 300 BBC staff walked out of TV centre in west London in support of Mr Dyke after he announced he was quitting. And one local radio station, BBC Somerset Sound, even went off air for a minute this afternoon in protest at the resignation of Mr Dyke and what staff called the “abject” apology from the BBC.
Former chairman of the governors Christopher Bland said there was a “curious imbalance” in the report which exonerated the Government but “tarred and feathered the BBC”.
“It is legitimate to question whether Hutton was even-handed in the way he treated on the one hand politicians, civil servants and the security services, and on the other hand the standards of conduct he applied to journalists and broadcasters,” he said.
Lord Rees-Mogg, former vice-chair of the BBC board, declared: “I don’t have any confidence in Hutton. I have not fully read his report but I have already come to the conclusion that his evidence does not support his conclusions and that it is, put quite simply, a bad bit of work.”
BBC insider Mark Byford has been named as acting operational boss.
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