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The BBC has been accused of ‘shocking’ breaches of impartiality by a senior whistleblower. Michael Prescott, who spent three years as an independent external adviser to the broadcaster’s Editorial Guidelines and Standards Committee (EGSC) before leaving the role in June, sent a damning internal dossier to the BBC Board last month after repeated warnings to the standards watchdog were ‘dismissed or ignored’. In the memo, Prescott details how the corporation ‘doctored’ a speech by Donald Trump to make it appear like he had encouraged the Capitol Hill riots during an episode of Panorama. The ‘mangled’ excerpt ‘completely misled’ viewers, when it was broadcast in October 2024, by showing the president telling supporters he was going to walk to the Capitol with them to ‘fight like hell”, when he actually said he would walk with them ‘to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard’. The report said the programme made the US president ‘“say” things [he] never actually said’ by editing together footage from the start of his speech with something he said nearly an hour later. When the Panorama 'distortion’ was raised with BBC managers, they ‘refused to accept there had been a breach of standards’. The memo’s author subsequently warned Samir Shah, the BBC chairman, of the ‘very, very dangerous precedent’ set by Panorama but received no reply. Other complaints in the memo accuse the corporation of ‘effective censorship’ of its coverage of the transgender debate and also takes aim at the BBC’s Arabic service of bias over its coverage of the war in Gaza. It is now understood that Prescott’s report is circulating amongst senior figures in Whitehall. The former BBC adviser who authored the report compared the ‘shocking’ breaches of impartiality to the Crowngate scandal, which led to the resignation of the controller of BBC One when footage of Queen Elizabeth II was edited to look like she had stormed out of a photoshoot. He said he was compelled to speak out because of his ‘despair at inaction by the BBC Executive when issues come to light’. He sent the report to the BBC Board because repeated warnings to the EGSC were ‘dismissed or ignored’. He wrote in the report’s covering letter: ‘I departed [from the advisory role] with profound and unresolved concerns about the BBC…my view is that the Executive repeatedly failed to implement measures to resolve highlighted problems, and in many cases simply refused to acknowledge there was an issue at all.’ He said he had been shocked at the defensiveness of Jonathan Munro, the BBC’s senior controller of news content, and Deborah Turness, chief executive of BBC News, when his complaints were raised. He added: ‘Firm and transparent action plans to prevent the re-occurrence of problems are in short supply – and so, as you can see, errors are repeated time and again.’ The accusations come at a critical time for the BBC who are facing funding negotiations with the government when the royal charter comes up for renewal in 2027. Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has previously said ‘no options are off the table’ when it comes to BBC funding. A BBC spokesperson told the Mail: ‘While we don’t comment on leaked documents, when the BBC receives feedback it takes it seriously and considers it carefully. ‘Michael Prescott is a former adviser to a board committee where differing views and opinions of our coverage are routinely discussed and debated.’
