BBC's Tim Davie refuses to say who paid for youngster's lawyer in sex scandal
Tim Davie was asked if the corporation had ascertained who paid for the young person's lawyer. Mr Davie refused to answer the question.
The Director General of the BBC has refused to say who paid for a young person's lawyer in a scandal which has rocked the BBC. Mr Davie was giving a statement following serious allegations made by the person's family against a BBC presenter earlier this week.
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Speaking at a virtual press conference, Mr Davie did not give a direct answer when asked by the Daily Mail if he's "hopeful that we will see the BBC presenter back on-air" if he's cleared.
In a statement at the start of the press conference, Mr Davie said: “We did receive a call on 19 May.
“That was taken by the audiences services team who then make a summary of the call. It did not include an allegation of criminality - but was very serious.
“Any affair of this nature is serious. Trust is absolutely fundamental to the BBC. It is too early to say how this impacts the BBC in terms of trust.”
“We need to run a fair process. This is very complex and very fast-moving. We need to balance duty of care, get across the legal issues in terms of privacy, and public interest.”
When asked, Mr Davie said he would not comment on whether he had spoken to the presenter concerned.
As the crisis has developed, the BBC has revealed that the Metropolitan Police has asked the corporation to pause its investigation whilst detectives do further scoping work.
In a statement, the BBC said: “We know that questions have been asked about how the complaint was initially managed, so today we have published an update that sets out key dates and some additional information that we are currently able to share.”
The BBC said it has protocols and processes for managing complaints and that matters are taken “extremely seriously”.
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The BBC added: “Events of recent days have shown how complex and challenging these kinds of cases can be and how vital it is that they are handled with the utmost diligence and care.”
The BBC has released a timeline of what happened. It said that The Sun informed the corporation on July 6 of allegations concerning a BBC presenter and that the source was the same family which approached the BBC on May 18 and 19.
They added that on the same day, the BBC launched an “incident management group” and senior managers held their first conversation on the matter with the presenter in question.
The next day, July 7, the BBC made contact with police and on July 9, the BBC confirmed that the presenter had been suspended.