Former BBC boss: Bashir was a “serial liar on an industrial scale”

Martin Bashir was a “serial liar on an industrial scale” and perpetrated “one of the biggest crimes in the history of broadcasting,” a former BBC boss has told MPs.

Former BBC director generals Lord Hall and Lord Birt appeared in front of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee (DCMS) today to give evidence on the BBC’s conduct surrounding Bashir’s now infamous 1995 Panorama interview with Diana, Princess of Wales.

Last month an independent probe by Lord Dyson found Bashir had been “deceitful” and commissioned fake documents to convince the princess she was being spied on, in what was a “serious breach” of the broadcaster’s guidelines.

The report also said the BBC had been “woefully ineffective” in its attempts to investigate the allegations of wrongdoing and that BBC bosses led a cover up of Bashir’s deception.

Grilled by MPs about why he had called Bashir an “honest and honourable man” following his 1996 inquiry into the journalist’s methods, Lord Hall said that he “trusted” Bashir and “gave him a second chance” – but that trust was “abused and misplaced” and the journalist “took us all in”.

Bashir returned to the BBC as religion correspondent in 2016, despite allegations about his conduct emerging not long after the Diana interview. He was promoted to religion editor in 2018 but quit the role for health reasons ahead of the publication of the Dyson report.

A review published this week found that there was no evidence Bashir was re-employed to cover up events surrounding the Diana interview, but that there was some awareness of controversy surrounding the interview – and of other controversies involving the journalist – before he returned.

Asked today about Bashir’s return to the BBC in 2016, Lord Hall said: “If we knew then what we know now, of course he wouldn’t have been re-hired.”

Hall apologised to the Royal family for the hurt caused by Martin Bashir’s Panorama interview with Diana, Princess of Wales and said: “We did what we thought was right at the time, investigating Martin Bashir not once but twice.”

DCMS committee chairman Julian Knight said it was “utterly extraordinary” that the BBC would re-employ Bashir – “a known liar”. 

Knight also criticised the decision to blacklist Matt Wiessler, the graphic designer who mocked up the documents and tried to raise the alarm, but not sack Bashir.

MPs also questioned Lord Birt, who was director general at the time the Panorama interview was originally broadcast.

Lord Birt described Bashir as a “serial liar on an industrial scale” and said he perpetrated “one of the biggest crimes in the history of broadcasting”.

However, he told MPs he had no concerns about Bashir while he was at the BBC, saying the journalist’s subsequent ITV interview with Michael Jackson, as well as his controversial remarks about former Alaska governor Sarah Palin and “Asian babes”, had given him cause for concern. 

Tim Davie, the current BBC director general, told MPs that an employee would be fired today for forging documents.

He said: “With the glory of hindsight, and with what I know now based on having personally commissioned Lord Dyson to go at this – that hiring would never have been made, there’s no doubt about that.”

Bashir has said mocking up the documents “was a stupid thing to do” and he regretted it, but that they had had no bearing on Diana’s decision to be interviewed.