The company apologised on Tuesday after an in depth exterior investigation by Gemma White KC uncovered “missed alternatives” that might have led to motion.
The BBC stated there have been “situations the place the organisation missed alternatives that may have led to motion,” even whereas the assessment discovered “no widespread or important BBC data of allegations or considerations about predatory sexual behaviour”.
It added: “The organisation fell brief and failed folks – together with our personal workers – who had a proper to count on higher from us,” the assertion stated.
“The board [wants] to take this chance to apologise on behalf of all the BBC to anybody impacted by what the assessment has discovered. Your voice has been heard, and the findings of the assessment will additional gas the drive to make sure it doesn’t occur once more.”
He was first interviewed in March 2023 concerning the offences alleged to have taken place in London between 1982 and 2016.
He was questioned once more a month later below warning over the alleged incidents.
The hip-hop DJ has beforehand strongly denied “all allegations of inappropriate behaviour” and wrongdoing.
Eighteen girls detailed their tales to BBC Information in 2022. Some girls stated they encountered Westwood once they had been below 18. One stated she was solely 14 when Westwood first had intercourse along with her.
Westwood rejected the claims and resigned from his present on radio station Capital Xtra.
Right here’s all the pieces we find out about him.
The British DJ and broadcaster helped to convey hip-hop to mainstream audiences within the UK. Born in East Anglia, he’s the son of Invoice Westwood, who later grew to become the Anglican Bishop of Peterborough. He was educated at a non-public faculty in Norwich earlier than attending a state secondary faculty.
Westwood started his profession as a DJ within the early Eighties, acting at golf equipment and pirate radio stations in London. He gained prominence on LWR and Capital Radio, the place he helped to introduce UK listeners to rising hip-hop acts from either side of the Atlantic.
Westwood started his radio profession at Kiss FM, the place he was a co-owner, earlier than shifting to Capital FM in 1987.
Westwood (pictured in 2014) is a British DJ and broadcaster, who helped to convey hip-hop to mainstream audiences within the UK
PA
His popularity as a tastemaker within the hip-hop and rap scene led to him interviewing a number of the greatest artists within the business, together with Infamous B.I.G., Jay-Z, Eminem, and Drake.
Past radio, Westwood was a key determine in hip-hop tv, internet hosting MTV UK’s Pimp My Trip UK, which ran from 2005 to 2007. He additionally based Tim Westwood TV, a YouTube channel that includes freestyles, interviews, and unique performances from main and underground rap artists, which amassed hundreds of thousands of views and have become a go-to platform for UK and worldwide hip-hop content material.
All through his profession, Westwood has been credited with championing UK rap and dirt, giving early publicity to artists corresponding to Skepta, Stormzy, and Giggs. Nevertheless, his affect has additionally been accompanied by controversy, with allegations of misconduct surfacing in later years.
What was Tim Westwood’s function on the BBC?
Westwood joined the BBC in 1994 following a presenter shake-up. He grew to become the primary DJ to host a devoted rap present on the community.
Over almost twenty years on the BBC, Westwood grew to become a number one hip-hop DJ, recognized for his influential interviews and shut ties with main artists within the business. He left the BBC in 2013, when his long-running present was axed as a part of a schedule revamp.
What did the report about him discover?
The Met and the Crime Prosecution Service requested the BBC in December to pause the report’s publication “to permit for additional time to think about any potential impression on the investigation.”
“Those that spoke or wrote to me referred to a sense that they may not elevate points with the controller or different folks in senior administration due to the significance of the ‘expertise’ to Radio 1/1Xtra,” Ms White stated.
“There was a sense that presenters had been valued over manufacturing workers and that senior administration had been more likely to facet with presenters.”
Along with “proof of their intention to create an setting during which staff would really feel capable of elevate considerations” Ms White identified that there was proof of senior administration “reacting firmly to public complaints regarding Tim Westwood.”
Nevertheless, she added that the “mixture of the shortage of ritual adopted in respect of considerations about office misconduct which had been raised, and the kind of materials which was broadcast on air” in all probability created an environment the place staff weren’t positive that considerations concerning the DJ’s office behaviour “could be correctly addressed.”
The BBC said that the report price £3.3 million.
It reported a Met consultant as saying on Monday: “A full file of proof stays with the CPS for his or her consideration. Detectives from the Met proceed to make enquiries, with assist from prosecutors.”
When was Tim Westwood shot?
In 1999, Westwood was shot in Kennington, south London, when gunmen on a bike pulled up alongside his Vary Rover and opened hearth.
“A bullet went by way of the again of my seat an inch from my backbone,” he instructed the Guardian in 2017. “One other bullet went by way of my arm and missed the nerves, which might have left me paralysed. The man within the again seat had his kneecap blown off. Am I not blessed? Thank God I’m alive and everybody survived.”
The assault, which happened after a nightclub look, was broadly purported to be linked to tensions inside the UK hip-hop and storage scenes on the time. Nevertheless, nobody was ever charged in reference to the taking pictures.
Tim Westwood is 67, having been born on October 3, 1957.
His age has lengthy been a degree of competition, as he has ceaselessly been accused of mendacity about it to look youthful.
