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BBC chief to explain Queen gaffe

18/07/2007

The BBC's director general Mark Thompson will today give his account of the row over a documentary trailer featuring the Queen.

In a meeting with the BBC Trust the corporation's chief will also discuss the first ever fine imposed on the broadcaster, after the media regulator punished the BBC for faking the results of a competition run by children's programme Blue Peter.

TV production company RDF publicly admitted on Monday that it was to blame for the latest blunder, in which a clip from a documentary falsely appeared to show the Queen storming out of a photo shoot with celebrity snapper Annie Leibovitz.

The BBC was left red-faced last week after it emerged that clips from the trailer, shown to journalists at an autumn season press launch, had been edited together in the wrong order.

An e-mail written to Mr Thompson by RDF chief executive David Frank admitted that his company was "guilty of a serious error of judgement" over the footage it produced as part of the forthcoming documentary, A Year With The Queen.

However the affair has cast a shadow over the BBC in the wake of the scandal concerning the fake Blue Peter competition.

Ofcom fined the BBC £50,000 earlier this week after it emerged that a studio guest had been asked to pose as a phone-in competition winner due to a technical glitch last November.

Ahead of today's talks at Broadcasting House, it has also been reported that two new potential phone in scandals involving BBC shows have since come to light.

It is thought that the incidents were reported by BBC staff after the corporation's management urged them to highlight programmes that they felt may have misled audiences.

Meanwhile, reports claim that the daytime antique series Flog It! has also come under scrutiny after concerns were raised that a woman was shown bidding for an auction lot when she had actually been at an earlier sale.

However the footage from a 2005 episode is said to have been changed after the woman's husband complained.

Urging BBC staff to maintain standards in a memo sent to them last week, Mr Thompson stressed: "We cannot allow even a small number of lapses, whether intentional or as a result of sloppiness, to undermine our reputation and the confidence of the public."



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