Sir Ed Davey has called for Sir Robbie Gibb to be ousted from the BBC board.
The Liberal Democrat leader said that Sir Robbie – who served as Theresa May’s director of communications – should have “no role in appointing the new director general” following the departure of Tim Davie.
It follows claims that Sir Robbie “led the charge” in claims over systemic bias in the corporation, which was followed by the resignation of Mr Davie and the head of BBC News, Deborah Turness.
Writing in The Guardian, the Lib Dem leader said that “to ensure the BBC’s independence, impartiality and trust, Sir Robbie should have no role in appointing the new director general”.
He wrote: “The government should remove him from the board immediately – and end the practice of political appointments, which so badly undermines the BBC, altogether.”
Sir Robbie, who was appointed to the board by Boris Johnson and confirmed by Rishi Sunak, has described himself as a “proper Thatcherite Conservative”. Alan Rusbridger, who writes for The Independent, has detailed how Sir Robbie led the mystery consortium to buy The Jewish Chronicle on behalf of a secret backer whose identity has never been revealed. His stewardship of that paper saw it mired in a number of its own ethical and editorial failings.
He is also reported to be a friend of Michael Prescott, a former external adviser to the BBC’s editorial standards committee who wrote the bombshell report which raised concerns about the way clips of Donald Trump’s speech were spliced together to make it appear he had told supporters he was going to walk to the US Capitol with them to “fight like hell”.
Mr Davie and Ms Turness resigned on Sunday evening amid the scandal surrounding the Panorama programme, titled Trump: A Second Chance?. The corporation and ministers are coming under pressure over the matter, with a long-expected consultation on the BBC’s new charter expected to begin in the coming weeks.
In the same Guardian piece, Sir Ed said: “The disturbing escalation in the assault on the BBC should be incredibly alarming to anyone who cares about truth, accountability and democracy.
“Trump and his mates are trying to destroy one of our most precious British institutions, and we must act fast to stop them.”
He said that the corporation “is not perfect”, but claimed that critics are “seizing on a single mistake by one BBC programme as an excuse to undermine the whole organisation.
“We simply cannot let that happen.”
Mr Trump has threatened legal action of $1bn (£762m) against the broadcaster over the Panorama programme. The BBC has until Friday to respond to the US president’s legal threat, which he plans to issue under Florida law.
Meanwhile, a minister has said that the country should not have a “national meltdown” over the saga.
Speaking to Times Radio on Tuesday, local government minister Alison McGovern said that the BBC should invest in “quality journalism”.
She told the station: “The question I have is, has there been bad editing here? Has there been issues?
“If there has, the answer to that is to get better editing and to invest in quality journalism and sort the problems out.
“I don’t think we need to have a national meltdown about this.
“I think we need to make sure that the BBC, one of our most trusted media organisations, invests in quality journalism and tells the stories that we all want to hear.”
