The BBC could face a criminal probe over claims it concealed damning documents linked to Martin Bashir’s controversial interview with Princess Diana.
In an extraordinary intervention, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) last night said its criminal investigations team is reviewing a complaint that the BBC breached the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA).
If the Corporation is successfully prosecuted, it would be facing an unlimited fine.
The development comes a week after The Mail on Sunday revealed a judge has ordered the BBC to hand over a cache of thousands of emails – which could unveil an ongoing cover-up of what executives knew about the deception Bashir used to secure his 1995 Panorama interview.
The ICO’s statement is yet another blow to the BBC’s hopes of drawing a line under its biggest scandal.
Bashir obtained his landmark exposé – in which Diana famously said ‘there were three of us in this marriage’, referring to Charles’s then-mistress Camilla – by spinning an elaborate web of deceit.
He lied that Prince William’s watch had been bugged to record her conversations and then had bank statements faked to draw the vulnerable Princess into his trust.
In October 2020, following a Freedom of Information request, the BBC sent journalist Andy Webb a 67-page dossier of memos and minutes from 1995 and 1996 which detailed its internal investigation into Bashir’s methods.
The broadcaster, however, withheld a string of incriminating documents because it said Bashir was ‘seriously unwell’ and it was unable to ‘discuss this matter with him’.
But emails later emerged from bosses at the time being in regular contact with their former reporter. And while the BBC withheld damning documents from Mr Webb, it did make public a memo that made a false – and highly defamatory – claim that earl Spencer, Diana’s brother, colluded with Bashir.
The allegation has been emphatically denied by the earl. In a complaint to the ICO, Mr Webb claimed the BBC had breached Section 77 the FOIA, which makes it a criminal offence if an individual ‘alters, defaces, blocks, erases, destroys or conceals’ information to stop it being disclosed by a public authority.
And in a major blow to the BBC, the ICO last night confirmed it was examining Mr Webb’s objection.
A spokesman said: ‘Mr Webb’s case has been referred to the criminal investigations team who are reviewing the material provided.’ Mr Webb said: ‘I’ve long suspected that what the BBC has done is more than a betrayal of trust.
Now we may learn if this is true.’ ex-ITN boss Professor Stewart Purvis, formerly of Ofcom, said: ‘It’s most unusual – possibly unprecedented – for the BBC to be the subject of such an inquiry.’
The Corporation said ‘all relevant documentation’ in its possession was passed to an inquiry into the Bashir scandal led by former Supreme Court judge Lord Dyson, which published a damning report in 2021.
A spokesman said: “We reject these allegations entirely, including any suggestion the BBC has acted unlawfully. We have repeatedly set out to Mr Webb that Martin Bashir’s significant health issues prevented us from disclosing documentation in 2020, as we were unable to consult him on the substantive issues.”
The MoS revealed last weekend how a leading judge had questioned the BBC’s honesty after it fought a two-year campaign to keep thousands of emails, sent by BBC managers between September and November 2020, underwraps.
The broadcaster said it accepts ‘mistakes have been made’ and that it is considering the ruling.