Speeches by Smith.

“That is the executive; can we talk briefly about the board? What do you want to do about changing the composition of the board? In particular, would you want to change the number of non-exec board members?”

“Do you have a view?”

“Do you think it is important to have political appointees to the board? Is it right? That is for all three of you.”

“Appointed by politicians.”

“Could the contributions be provided by somebody with journalistic experience, not appointed by the Government?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I think there could be an accusation that you did not represent the Grossman report fairly in your memo, and that you picked up all the points that he made that were criticisms of the BBC, without stating the context, which was, generally speaking, that he was positive about the coverage, and had put forward thes…”

“Is that the fault of individuals? You talked about it being systemic, but it sounds like you are putting the blame on individuals for not following through.”

“To what extent is that the fault of the committee? You talked about systemic problems; where do they lie?”

“Am I right to read into what Caroline said that in the thematic reviews the committee is looking not just at things that have gone wrong, but proactively at future challenges?”

“Before we get into the issues arising from the memo, can we talk about the role of the editorial guidelines and standards committee? You are here, obviously, as external advisers to it. Can you talk about its purpose, and how each of you were recruited and appointed to it?”

“Yes.”

“Could the contributions be provided by somebody with journalistic experience, not appointed by the Government?”

“Were you surprised?”

“Do you think it is important to have political appointees to the board? Is it right? That is for all three of you.”

“Do you have a view?”

“That is the executive; can we talk briefly about the board? What do you want to do about changing the composition of the board? In particular, would you want to change the number of non-exec board members?”

“How do they demonstrate that they have fixed those systemic problems?”

“Would you agree that they have acknowledged that that was an issue? I am looking at a quote that says that it is “the one significant exception to our usually excellent record of reporting polling”. That particular problem with that particular poll was acknowledged.”

“Do you think it was impartial?”