Culture Secretary to hold talks with BBC boss following Huw Edwards’ guilty plea
The Culture Secretary will hold urgent talks with BBC director general Tim Davie in the wake of Huw Edwards admitting to accessing indecent photographs of children, the PA news agency understands.
Lisa Nandy is set to hold a meeting with the BBC boss after the corporation said it was told of the veteran broadcaster’s arrest on “suspicion of serious offences” last November but continued employing him until April.
Following Edwards’ guilty plea, the broadcaster claimed it would have dismissed the presenter “immediately” if he was charged while still an employee at the corporation.
The Welsh broadcaster, 62, pleaded guilty to “making” indecent photographs, with seven of the 41 being of the most serious type, at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday.
The offences were committed between December 2020 and August 2021, when Edwards was still a fixture on the BBC.
Duke Of Edinburgh
During that period, he fronted coverage of major national events including the funeral of the late Duke Of Edinburgh in April 2021.
Edwards came off air in July 2023 after allegations emerged that he had paid a young person for sexually explicit photos, in a separate matter to the court hearing on Wednesday.
Senior BBC management told staff they were “appalled” to learn of Edwards’ guilty plea in an internal note sent to staff, which was co-signed by Mr Davie.
The note, which was also signed by Deborah Turness, chief executive of BBC News & Current Affairs, and group chief operating officer Leigh Tavaziva, added that “there can be no place for such behaviour” at the BBC.
Ms Nandy was named as the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer earlier this month.
The 44-year-old Labour MP, who had been shadow cabinet minister for international development prior to the general election, took over from Conservative Lucy Frazer, who lost her Ely and East Cambridgeshire seat to the Liberal Democrats.
During Ms Frazer’s tenure, she held an urgent meeting with Mr Davie last July following claims that a then-unnamed presenter had paid a young person for sexually explicit photos.
Edwards’ wife later named him as the presenter at the the centre of the scandal.
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Does anyone seriously believe that the BBC was unaware of Edwards’s misbehaviour before this issue blew up? The organisation has a long rap sheet on such matters.
BBC try to protect their ‘top talent’, that’s why the BBC ignored Jimmy Saville’s behaviour and more recently when allegation were made about Strictly, the BBC protected their programme at the expense of individuals. They knew a lot more about Huw Edwards than they are saying.
Who gets a 10% pay rise, when they are off sick for a year and have also been arrested?
“Edwards came off air in July 2023 after allegations emerged that he had paid a young person for sexually explicit photos, in a separate matter to the court hearing on Wednesday.”
Using the wording “young person” here implies a child, but this incident involved a consenting adult and shouldn’t be conflated with actual CSAM.
The BBC hierarchy as a whole has a lot to answer for. A once bastion of trust & quality known throughout the world sadly became a den on iniquity where paedophiles like Jimmy Saville were protected by a wall of silence and whistle blowers silenced with threat of exclusion. This is an organisation paid by us the license fee payer who was also in the past racist towards black & Asian people, prejudice towards Wales and the Welsh, where cash cow, and I emphasise cow in cash cow, Anne Robinson’s rancid rant on Room 101 xenophobic abuse & attack that… Read more »