Copyright Deadline
A BBC crisis that ranks right up there on the ‘BBC crisis’ scale has befallen the nation’s 100-year-old public broadcaster, and the corporation suddenly finds itself seeking a Director General and a head of news. Late on Sunday, shockwaves were sent through New Broadcasting House and beyond with the double resignation of Tim Davie and Deborah Turness, both of whom will exit over the coming months following what they termed an “orderly transition to a successor.” In the end, the Donald Trump editing scandal proved one too many for Davie and Turness, who have been swimming against the tide over the past couple of years following controversies involving Gary Lineker, Huw Edwards, and Gaza documentaries. While the resignations came out of the blue, thoughts have immediately turned to who will succeed Davie in what remains undoubtedly the biggest job in British broadcasting. Given the scale of the uncertainty surrounding the loss of two key executives, the BBC board will need to act quickly to install someone who can lead the corporation into charter renewal talks with the government. Davie’s successor will want to hire a replacement for Turness (he poached Turness from ITN after she had initially turned the role down), and the two jobs are inextricably linked. Given the nature of the scandal that brought them down, our sources were unified in their feeling that, unlike Davie, the next Director General should have news experience. “For all of Tim’s great strengths, it was the news f**k ups that eventually brought him down,” said one ex-BBC executive. Another posited that the next DG needs “both journalistic weight and the ability to run a complex organisation efficiently.” “It’s not enough to be a good manager, you need journalism to do that,” they said. With this in mind, numerous sources from across the industry settled on Apple executive Jay Hunt, a former BBC Six O’Clock News editor, and James Harding, the ex-BBC current affairs boss who now runs Tortoise Media and the Observer, as credible candidates. There is also a feeling that it is high time the BBC went for a female candidate, given that every one of the corporation’s 18 Director Generals has been male. Read on as Deadline walks you through some of the executives likely to be in the mix. Jay Hunt “It’s got to be Jay, hasn’t it?” texted one former BBC exec the morning after Davie resigned. The head of Apple TV in Europe has been linked with a variety of big TV jobs in recent months, not least Channel 4 chief executive, though she is not in the running to take over the Gogglebox network. Hunt is seen as having an attractive mix of experience on her CV. She has run BBC One and held down the top creative roles at Channel 5 and Channel 4, with notable hits at the latter, including poaching The Great British Bake Off from the BBC and launching Black Mirror. After leaving Channel 4 in 2017, she joined Apple TV, where she has delivered series including Bad Sisters and Hijack. Experience at a U.S. tech giant could be seen as valuable in an environment in which the BBC is competing for viewers’ attention with the likes of YouTube and Netflix. Hunt has also kept her hand in with public service duties, chairing the British Film Institute. Crucially, Hunt is also a former journalist, with experience in the BBC newsroom editing the Six O’Clock News. Insiders remember her being a gutsy editor, who was unafraid to ruffle feathers. Hunt will likely have to take a significant pay cut to run the BBC (Davie earns at least £540,000 ($709,000)), and there are questions as to whether she would even want the job. She is also not without controversy on her CV: Miriam O’Reilly won an age discrimination case against the BBC after the presenter was dropped from rural affairs show Countryfile during Hunt’s time running BBC One. James Harding James Harding, a former editor of The Times of London, was the BBC’s director of news and current affairs between 2013 and 2018, joining in the wake of the Jimmy Savile crisis. During his tenure he oversaw history-defining stories including the first Trump presidency and Brexit. Harding left the BBC to found his own outfit, Tortoise Media, which recently acquired the Observer from the Guardian, but he made something of a return to the BBC sphere over the summer after delivering an impassioned Edinburgh TV Festival MacTaggart lecture to a room packed full of industry execs. Taking into account the scandal that has just spelled the end for Davie and Turness, it is notable that Harding’s MacTaggart included a blueprint for the corporation to be more independent of government, thereby pivoting to become the “People’s Platform.” “Political interference – and the perception of a political presence looming over the BBC – is a problem, one that we’ve got too accustomed to,” Harding said at the time. Harding is calm under pressure, has run three different newsrooms and, having masterminded Tortoise’s Observer acquisition, now has some commercial chops. But given how recently the Observer acquisition closed, the more pertinent question is whether the timing is right for Harding. “James would probably be the strongest DG and best able to manage the political pressure and revitalize the journalism, but I don’t see how he abandons the Observer five minutes after buying it,” floated a former close colleague. Charlotte Moore Charlotte Moore was viewed by some as the heir apparent to Davie’s predecessor Tony Hall, and it was expected that the former BBC content boss would become DG in 2020 after Hall stepped down. In the end, Davie swooped, but Moore’s status as one of the BBC’s best and brightest talents is undoubted. Moore recently exited the BBC to join Sony, but who’s to say she wouldn’t fancy another shot at the top job? During her tenure, she greenlit hits including The Traitors, I May Destoy You and Gavin and Stacey: The Finale. She is also a fierce public broadcasting champion. News experience, or a lack of, may count against her, however. “It would be insane if the next DG has no real news background and that is a problem that Charlotte will have,” said one of the ex-BBC executives quoted above. Jane Turton Jane Turton was in the running to replace Tony Hall in 2020, and there are many who believe the All3Media CEO should take another shot at the BBC top job. Turton is a highly respected executive, who has run All3Media for a decade, recently delivering the BBC its biggest unscripted hit in years in the shape of The Traitors. She was heavily involved in the £1.15B sale of All3Media to RedBird IMI, though the deal has not yet unlocked the investment Turton had longed for. Having initially been connected with the vacant Channel 4 CEO gig, sources pointed to Turton being more interested in running the BBC than Channel 4. There is no doubting her commercial acumen, but a lack of news and public service experience could count against her at such a perilous moment for the BBC. Alex Mahon Former Channel 4 CEO Alex Mahon is another on this list who has only just started a new job. Her time running Channel 4 was somewhat topsy turvy, but she steered the nation’s irreverent broadcaster through some tricky times – including an attempted sell-off by the government – and was impressive when invited to speak in front of parliamentary committees, which would count in her favor. Like Moore, Mahon lacks news experience, but a former Channel 4 colleague said that doesn’t mean she is without merit. “Alex would be brilliant at the stakeholder management and crisis management, and has surprisingly strong editorial judgement despite her non-journalistic background,” they added. Mahon’s new gig is outside the industry, running live events firm Superstruct, which is backed by private equity giants KKR and CVC Capital Partners. She is something of an outside bet but should absolutely be in the conversation. Outsiders
