UK media watchdog starts probe into BBC, ITV over sex abuse claims

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British media watchdog Ofcom said on Thursday that it had launched an investigation into BBC’s Newsnight and ITV1's This Morning programmes over new allegations arising about historic sexual abuse of children in the 1970s and 1980s in the UK.

The two shows are under investigation for breaching “generally accepted standards” and for breaching “the application of standards to prevent unfair treatment to an individual, and unwarranted infringements of privacy.”

The Newsnight report on November 2 had wrongly implicated a senior Conservative Party politician from the Thatcher-era in a child abuse scandal at a care home in Wrexham in north Wales and this had led to the sudden resignation of the director-general, George Entwistle, last week.

Prime Minister David Cameron was ambushed on a live television interview last week by ITV’s This Morning presenter Phillip Schofield who handed him a list of alleged sex abuse perpetrators. The list of Conservative Party figures, drawn from gossip circulating on the Internet, was exposed to the cameras, making the names visible to millions of TV viewers.

ITV has already taken “appropriate disciplinary action” over the incident against Schofield. “Last Thursday we began an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the mistake on that day’s This Morning programme, for which both Phillip Schofield and ITV apologised. This investigation has now concluded and the appropriate disciplinary action has been taken,” the broadcaster said and issued an apology.

“We sincerely apologise because the way in which the issue was raised was clearly wrong and should have been handled differently. We have taken steps to make sure our editorial processes are always properly followed, which was not the case in this instance, and to ensure such an error will not be made again.”

Reports on Thursday also indicated that the BBC is close to reaching a financial settlement with the Tory politician after apologising to him, but there has been no confirmation as yet. The Tory politician is also understood to be ready to start legal action against users of social networking site Twitter, who had named him in connection with the child sex abuse scandal.

The Met police also arrested another man as part of its investigation into the Jimmy Savile shild sex abuse scandal.