BBC chairman Samir Shah says broadcaster needs more northern working class staff
He also discussed how junior staff have felt ‘vulnerable’ and ‘preyed on’ by people with power.
BBC chairman Samir Shah has said the broadcaster needs “more variety” and “diversity of thought” as well as more staff who are “northern working class”.
Mr Shah, 73, who is responsible for upholding and protecting the independence of the BBC, reflected on claims the corporation has a liberal bias.
“The media recruits graduates from the arts, humanities, and they tend to be metropolitan and to have a point of view you could describe as liberal centre, centre left. We kind of reflect that,” he told The Times.
A protest was held outside Broadcasting House on Thursday with demonstrators claiming the BBC had aired Hamas propaganda.
“We make mistakes in our journalism. We correct mistakes”, Mr Shah said.
He added: “There needs to be greater accountability. People have to face the consequences of what they do.”
Mr Shah also spoke about the importance of diversity and said the BBC “needs to do a lot more to ensure our staff reflects the country as a whole. We need more variety and diversity”.
Expanding on this, he said: “More diversity of thought. It’s on, frankly, the northern working class where we’re poor. That’s where the focus should be.”
Mr Shah has been in his role since March 2024 and said he was “surprised in my first year at having this procession of men” who have had allegations made against them.
“The theme that keeps coming through is that junior staff are vulnerable to being preyed on by people with power. We have to stop it,” he said.
“I will not tolerate junior staff being scared to report what’s happening or their managers looking the other way.”
He added: “We need to have some way of preserving whistleblowers’ anonymity, so we can throw people out and do it quickly. I’m absolutely determined. This is a cancer we need to cut out.”
In January, a BBC review into the conduct of Brand during his time with the broadcaster found a number of people “felt unable to raise” concerns about the presenter and believed he “would always get his way and therefore they stayed silent”.
Last year, Edwards was handed a suspended sentence after admitting three charges of “making” indecent photographs after he was sent 41 illegal images by convicted paedophile Alex Williams over WhatsApp.
The BBC continued to pay Edwards his annual salary after discovering he had been arrested on “suspicion of serious offences” in November 2023.
Mr Shah said: “We now know he was a villain but back then he had not been convicted. Remember, we’ve seen people in the entertainment industry arrested and not charged.”
He continued: “Imagine if we effectively said, ‘This guy’s guilty’, and it turned out not to be true. We did the best job we could in the circumstances.”
Mr Shah said he had “known him for a long time” and “had no idea”.
“None at all. He lied about everything — and deceived us”, he said.
