BBC on collision course with Downing Street

["Nello Margiotta" <animarg at tin.it>]

By Ian Burrell, Marie Woolf and Kim Sengupta
07 July 2003
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=422412

The chairman of the BBC emerged from a crisis meeting of the organisation's
governors last night and set the corporation on a collision course with the
Government by demanding an apology from Downing Street over the Iraqi arms
dossier row.
Gavyn Davies called on Tony Blair's director of communications, Alastair
Campbell, to withdraw claims that the BBC had displayed bias against the
Government in its coverage of the war in Iraq.
The demand followed calls by Mr Blair and other senior government figures
earlier yesterday for the BBC to apologise for claims made in a report on
Radio 4's Today programme that Downing Street had "sexed up" a dossier on
Iraq's weapons capabilities. The exchanges were the latest round in a war of
attrition that will come to a head today with the publication of a report by
a parliamentary committee into the Government's handling of the Iraqi
threat. The Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee is expected to clear Mr
Campbell of direct interference in the dossier but to criticise his role in
the publication of a separate dossier.
Mr Davies issued his rebuttal after governors spent two-and-a-half hours
questioning Greg Dyke, the BBC's director general, and Richard Sambrook, the
director of news, over the row. Mr Davies said: "The board reiterates that
the BBC's overall coverage of the war, and the political issues surrounding
it, has been entirely impartial and it emphatically rejects Mr Campbell's
claim that large parts of the BBC had an agenda against the war. We call on
Mr Campbell to withdraw these allegations against the BBC and its
journalists."
The BBC chairman said he was satisfied that the Today programme had
"properly followed" producers' guidelines in broadcasting the story by its
defence correspondent, Andrew Gilligan, that led to the controversy. The
story was based on the word of a single source from the intelligence
services.
Mr Davies said: "Although the guidelines say that the BBC should be
reluctant to broadcast stories based on a single source ... they clearly
allow for this to be done in exceptional circumstances. Stories based on
senior intelligence sources are a case in point."
He did not produce further evidence to back up the story, except to say that
the central allegation "fitted in to a general pattern of concern, conveyed
to a number of BBC journalists with good contacts in the security services".
Broadcasting the story, he said, had been in the public interest. "It was
entirely proper to reflect some unease about the presentation of the
Government's arguments in the disputed dossiers," he said.
In what appeared to be a softening of the BBC position, Mr Davies went out
of his way to say that the corporation's journalists had never accused Mr
Blair of lying. He said the BBC would also review its rules on journalists
writing for other publications after Mr Gilligan used a newspaper's columns
to reiterate his claims. Despite the BBC's softer line, Downing Street
continued to press for a retraction, criticising the corporation's efforts
to "defend the indefensible". A spokesman also repeated claims that the
integrity of the Prime Minister had been "attacked".
He said: "Over a month later, the BBC still haven't answered the question,
'Do they believe those allegations to be true, or false, yes or no?'. When
the full facts of this are set out, any reasonable person will see that they
are proved to be false."
However, Robin Cook, the former leader of the Commons, accused Mr Campbell
of skilfully using the row with the BBC to divert attention from claims that
there was no evidence that Iraq held weapons of mass destruction. "He has
managed to convince half of the media that the foreign affairs inquiry is
into the origins of his war with Andew Gilligan, not into the war with
Iraq," he said in an interview with The Guardian.
Referring to the disputed dossier, he added: "It clearly wasn't accurate.
There aren't any weapons ready for use in 45 minutes ... there was no
nuclear weapons programme."