Veteran TV newsreader Peter Sissons has explained in a piece for the Mail on Sunday what prompted him to leave BBC News after 20 years.
Here are some selected quotes:
“At today’s BBC, a complaint I often heard from senior producers was that they dared not reprimand their subordinates for basic journalistic mistakes – such as getting ages, dates, titles and even football scores wrong – it being politically incorrect to risk offending them.”
“The BBC’s huge newsroom has too many people in it who are more interested in the technology of the multimedia world, rather than boring old things such as words. For many of them, it is not a newsroom but a news-processing plant.”
“When things go well those leading the BBC’s journalism are quick to share the credit, but when things go wrong they can hang you out to dry.”
“I was no longer comfortable at BBC News. It remains an iconic organisation, but it stands at the crossroads. The many good friends of mine in the newsroom always complain privately about the surplus of bureaucracy and the lack of leadership. The people at the top of the BBC seem to confuse the two.”
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