Boardroom, not newsroom, is where BBC bias risk lies

The corporation has been left in disarray after a tumultuous week marked by mistakes, resignations and the threat of a $1bn presidential lawsuit. But, writes Alan Rusbridger, the real threat to impartiality doesn’t come from its journalists

- Alan Rusbridger

When the saga of the double-decapitation of the two most senior BBC executives comes to be written, historians might care to trace it back to Dougie Smith, a shadowy backroom fixer once described as the most powerful political figure you've never heard of.

Google “Dougie Smith” and not much will come up, beyond the fact that he was one of the organisers of Fever, a sex party business that hosted lavish orgies in posh London venues. But his day job - splitting his time between Conservative HQ and No 10 - involved getting the “right” people into the “right” roles.

Mostly, that involved vetting each and every Tory potential candidate for parliament with what observers called a “vice-like grip”. But, according to Tim Shipman, now The Spectator's political editor, he also paid very close attention to inserting right-thinking people into quangos and public posts.

In June 2021, Shipman wrote a piece for The Sunday Times headlined “How the Tories weaponised woke”, which revealed how Smith had been instrumental in getting his longstanding friend Sir Robbie Gibb onto the BBC board.

It is one of the oddities of governance that five out of 13 members of the supposedly independent BBC are, in fact, appointed by the government of the day. Each region has a representative, and Smith had noticed that Dr Ashley Steel, a below-the-radar former KPMG executive who represented England, would be stepping down.

Five out of 13 members of the supposedly independent BBC are, in fact, appointed by the government of the day (PA)

“He pressed for months to see Sir Robbie Gibb, the former No 10 communications director, put on the board of the BBC, forcing it through despite a lack of enthusiasm from Johnson,” wrote Shipman.