BBC Admits Destroying Princess Diana Panorama Interview Documents

BBC Admits Destroying Princess Diana Panorama Interview Documents despite denying it previously

Despite previously saying there was no evidence that it had done so, the BBC has now admitted destroying documents relating to Princess Diana’s controversial Panorama interview with Martin Bashir in 1995.

The Mail on Sunday revealed that they had asked the BBC last year, in a request submitted under the Freedom of Information Act, to provide them with a list of which files that had destroyed since 2018 that related to the famous panorama interview, to which the broadcaster allegedly replied, “No archived files have been destroyed since 2018, or at a previous date, with Panorama and Diana Princess of Wales in the title”.

After being challenged by the Mail On Sunday over their response, the BBC changed its position and said that relevant documents destroyed between 2004 and 2009,  had ‘little archive value’ or ‘were duplications of other records’, and were ‘not retained’, but that it could not identify them ‘because it does not hold further information.

A spokesman for the BBC said that a more ‘detailed search’ had uncovered the additional information, but Andrew Bridgen, a Tory MP said on the matter, “The BBC surely must know what documents it has destroyed or how does it know that it has destroyed any documents? They are being evasive”.

The BBC is already under fire after it was revealed that licence fee-payers are footing 58-year-old Martin Bashir’s legal bill in the ongoing inquiry into allegations that he lied to convince Princess Diana to give the Panorama interview, with a BBC spokesperson saying, “In line with standard practice, we provide a capped contribution for legal support where former or current staff are required to participate”, as reported by dailymail.co.uk.

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