The Sun:
https://www.private-eye.co.uk/sections.php?issue=1603§ion_link=media_news
Sun v BBC: Huw's sorry now?
WITH Huw Edwards receiving in-patient mental health care and the BBC warning that its internal investigation is likely to go on at least until the autumn, many questions over the Sun's series of splashes remain unanswered.
The Eye has seen details of the complaint made by the stepfather of the young man at the centre of the initial story when he presented himself at the front desk of the BBC's office in Cardiff on 18 May. It specified that Edwards had first met him when he was 18 and there was no mention of photographs being exchanged, or any contact at all, prior to this age.
The stepfather also said the family had already contacted South Wales Police to report what was going on, but that the force had already told them nothing illegal appeared to have occurred. Although an amount of more than £30,000 exchanging hands was mentioned, there was no mention of it being used to buy drugs.
By the time the family's account appeared on the front page of the Sun on 8 July, however, it had become "giving the teen more than £35,000 since they were 17 in return for sordid images", and, inside, the even more loaded phrase "paid her crack-addicted child for sexual images".
Despite quoting former chief crown prosecutor Nazir Afzal on 9 July pointing out this was a potential criminal offence, and saying "the police should have been engaged... that should have been done weeks ago", running the headline "AT LAST BBC CALLS IN THE COPS" on 10 July, and carrying full details of the Protection of Children Act on 11 July, it was not until 12 July that the paper managed to admit, seven paragraphs into the sixth page of that day's coverage, that "separately it was confirmed that that the parents of the youngster struggling with drug issues first contacted a separate police force in April".
The Sun cited "Sky News reports" for this information – but in the lengthy self-justification that senior reporter Scarlet Howes penned two days later, after Edwards' identity had been confirmed and his hospitalisation with mental health problems revealed, she admitted the parents had told her "a fortnight ago" that they "went to their local police" and it was only when "they told them in April there was nothing they could do, they then turned to report it to the BBC".
AT WHAT precise point did News UK realise that it had dropped something of a bollock on its story?
A legal letter surfaced on the evening of Monday 10 July denying that anything "inappropriate or unlawful" had occurred and noting that the young man in question had made this clear to the Sun before it published its first story.
Executives were still bullish 24 hours later, demanding that disbelievers explain how a 20-year-old crack addict was suddenly able to afford the services of law firm Child & Child, swankily headquartered in St James's, London. Rupert Murdoch himself was also at this stage in close touch.
On the Wednesday morning, however, a promised appearance by Scarlet Howes, the journalist responsible for the story, on the Times Radio breakfast show failed to materialise. And that Thursday it emerged that the parents in the case had recorded an interview with News UK's TalkTV – but it, too, had failed to appear.
The Sun's run of front-page splashes by Howes ended abruptly on the Thursday after the statement about Edwards' medical issues.
ON 12 July a statement by Edwards' wife – drafted for her by Andy Coulson, whose experiences as News of the World editor and jailbird eminently qualify him for his role in PR crisis management – sparked a détente between the two forces that had been concentrating fire on the presenter: the Sun and, er, his colleagues at the BBC.
"The Sun has paused publishing further allegations against the presenter, and BBC News is expected to do the same," was the Chamberlain-ish declaration by Scarlet Howes in the paper's 14 July edition.
And indeed, no more hostile fire has been heard from Broadcasting House since that early skirmish when the BBC's own Newsnight reported on the news presenter "abusing his power" by sending messages to junior colleagues, "some late at night and signed off with kisses".
Among the many online activities Edwards may reconsider in future was the tweet he sent on 16 April ruling himself out of the redundancy programme being imposed on BBC News colleagues with a photograph of himself swigging champagne, beneath the now ironic message: "Don't believe everything in the papers."
