BBC Releases Documents Pertaining to Dyke’s Exit

LONDON, January 11: The
BBC has released the minutes of the organization’s board meeting in the wake of
the Hutton Report revealing why then Director-General Greg Dyke was asked to
resign.

The BBC has been keeping
the documents secret since Dyke stepped down in January 2004. The freedom of
information tribunal this week ordered the pubcaster to make the minutes
public.

At the January 28, 2004,
meeting, the then chairman Gavyn Davies offered his resignation. Dyke too
offered to step down, saying he would only continue if he had the full support
of the Board. “After a brief discussion, the board agreed that it would be
impossible to sustain Greg as DG in these circumstances since the board's
authority would be destroyed,” the minutes say.

The minutes reveal that
Dyke felt he had been “mistreated” by the Board of Governors and was “very
surprised and therefore shattered by the news” of having lost his job.

The Hutton Report in
January 2004 was called for after the suicide in July 2003 of government
scientist Dr David Kelly, who was named as the source of a BBC story about the
Iraq war. The report lambasted the BBC, calling its editorial system
“defective.”