November 20, 2012

Poll: 47% believe Lord Patten should resign over handling of Savile scandal

YouGov poll finds 52% of UK adults believe next DG should come from outside BBC
80% said £450,000 payout to Entwistle was 'unacceptable'
55% feel the BBC Trust chairman role should not be part-time

A new survey has found that almost half the public believe under-fire BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten should resign over the corporation's handling of the Jimmy Savile sex abuse scandal.

The same poll found that 52 per cent of the British public feel the next director-general should be appointed from outside the corporation.

George Entwistle, the former director-general who resigned over the Newsnight scandal last week, was head of BBC Vision before being promoted to the top job and had worked at the corporation for more than 20 years.

The YouGov poll for The Sunday Times also found that 80 per cent of the public believe the £450,000 payout to Entwistle following his resignation was “unacceptable”.

Fifty-two per cent of those surveyed said the role of director-general should be split in two, with one person charged with running the corporation and another responsible for the editor-in-chief role overseeing journalism at the BBC.

It comers after a separate YouGov poll for the Sun, carried out at the end of October in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, found that only 25 per cent of the public thought that Patten should step down.

Patten currently works part-time for three or four days a week as chairman of the Trust, but 55 per cent of those surveyed said the role should be full-time. A further 47 per cent said heshould resign over his handling of the scandal.