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The BBC will try to claw again the a whole lot of hundreds of kilos in wage paid to former star presenter Huw Edwards since his arrest in November final yr, it stated on Friday.
Edwards, who had been the BBC’s finest paid information reader with an annual wage of about £475,000, final month pleaded responsible to accessing indecent pictures of kids.
The BBC was conscious Huw Edwards had been arrested on suspicion of significant offences and continued using him for 5 months, though it stated it didn’t know the total particulars of the allegations. Edwards was charged on June 26.
On Friday, the BBC board stated that it had “authorised” the broadcaster’s administration to claw again wage paid to Edwards from the time of his arrest. It stated that Edwards had “pleaded responsible to an appalling crime. Had he been up entrance when requested by the BBC about his arrest, we might by no means have continued to pay him public cash”.
The board, whose job it’s to scrutinise the administration of the nationwide broadcaster, added that Edwards “has clearly undermined belief within the BBC and introduced us into disrepute”.
The 62-year-old had been the face of a lot of the BBC’s most prestigious protection of occasions, together with the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II, in addition to the principle presenter of the flagship BBC Information at Ten programme.
It isn’t clear how straightforward will probably be to demand reimbursement of the cash from Edwards, who was on medical go away for a lot of the yr and finally give up in April virtually a yr after preliminary allegations that he paid for sexually express pictures.
The board stated that it had met numerous occasions over the previous week to evaluate data offered by director-general Tim Davie and his govt group regarding Huw Edwards.
It supported the selections taken by Davie, saying that these have been based mostly on a spread of things together with the BBC’s authorized and contractual obligations, the information the broadcaster had on the time, considerations over its obligation of care to Edwards, and “due regard for the accountability that the BBC has for public cash”.
But it surely added that the administration had now agreed to take a look at the BBC’s strategy to guidelines about funds when workers have been suspended. It additionally stated the scandal had “put a highlight on the query of energy imbalances within the office”, and commissioned an impartial evaluate to strengthen the office tradition within the BBC.
Tradition secretary Lisa Nandy, who had known as for Edwards’s wage to be returned, stated: “Public belief within the BBC is crucial, and so I welcome the BBC’s choice to launch an impartial evaluate into the tradition inside the organisation following the Huw Edwards case and his abhorrent actions.”
