BBC board member with Tory links led charge' in systemic bias claims, say insiders

"A BBC board member with links to the Conservative party led the charge in pressuring the corporation's leadership over claims of systemic bias in coverage of Donald Trump, Gaza and transgender rights, the Guardian has been told. Sources said that Robbie Gibb, Theresa May's former communications chief who was appointed to the BBC's board during Boris Johnson's administration, amplified the criticisms in key board meetings that preceded the shock resignation of the director general, Tim Davie, and the head of BBC News, Deborah Turness."

"On another extraordinary day for the BBC, Trump threatened it with a billion-dollar legal action, after criticism of the way an edition of Panorama broadcast more than a year ago edited one of his speeches. The legal letter demands that false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements made about Trump must be retracted immediately. The edit was one of the criticisms raised in a memo by Michael Prescott, a former independent external adviser to the BBC's editorial guidelines and standards committee."

"After a week in which the BBC's leadership had been criticised by its own staff for failing to respond to Prescott's claims, the corporation's chair Samir Shah on Monday apologised for the Trump edit. Shah said there was an error of judgment over the way in which the programme spliced together two parts of a speech by Trump made before the attack on the US Capitol in January 2021."

Robbie Gibb, a BBC board member with links to the Conservative party, amplified criticisms in board meetings about alleged systemic bias in coverage of Donald Trump, Gaza and transgender rights. Those criticisms preceded the resignations of director general Tim Davie and head of BBC News Deborah Turness. Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey called for Gibb's removal from the board before a search for a new director general. Donald Trump threatened the BBC with a billion-dollar lawsuit over an edited Panorama broadcast and demanded retractions. Michael Prescott raised the edit among other criticisms, and BBC chair Samir Shah apologised for the error while describing Prescott's memo as partial.

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