The culture secretary has said former BBC newsreader Huw Edwards should return his salary after he admitted accessing indecent images of children.
Edwards was paid £200,000 after he was arrested in November while he was suspended by the broadcaster up until he resigned in April on medical advice.
On Wednesday, the 62-year-old BBC veteran pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy told Sky News at the Paris Olympics on Friday: “I think he ought to return his salary.
“I think having been arrested on such serious charges all the way back in November, to continue to receive that salary all the way through until he resigned is wrong and it’s not a good use of taxpayers’ money.
“I think most people in the country will agree with that but whether he does that or not is up to him.”
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Tim Davie, director general of the BBC, said on Thursday the corporation was aware Edwards had been arrested over the most serious category of indecent images of children when it happened.
He faced questions over why Edwards was not sacked then and why he continued to receive his salary – the highest of anybody at BBC News.
Mr Davie had an urgent meeting with Ms Nandy on Thursday to address his handling of the case.
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Ms Nandy said to Sky News: “My concern is to make sure that not only are we getting the decision right in this case but we’re futureproofing the BBC so that when people come forward with concerns, when decisions like this have to be made we’re open and transparent and we’re fair and we use taxpayers money appropriately.
“This is something that matters to the director general of the BBC and it’s my job to make sure we get there.”
Last month it emerged Edwards was paid between £475,000 and £479,999 for the year 2023/24 before he resigned.
BBC boss: ‘We knew it was serious’
Mr Davie suggested the corporation is considering legal action to recover some of the payments it made to Edwards.
When asked about the disgraced newsreader keeping his pension, Mr Davie said the money would be “very difficult to claw back, nigh on impossible”.
He told the BBC on Thursday: “When it comes to pay, again, (it’s) legally challenging (to recover), but we’ll look at all options.”
Huw Edwards pleaded guilty. Pic: PA
Mr Davie said the BBC did not sack Edwards after they were told of his arrest because the police said: “Look, we need to do our work in total confidence, we’ve arrested (Edwards) please keep this confidential.”
He added: “And at that point, I think the principle is clear in my mind, and I say we thought long and hard about this, this wasn’t a knee-jerk decision.
“And it was difficult but when the police, if you think about this in terms of precedent, people do get arrested and then we’ve had situations where (there were) no charges and there’s nothing there to be followed up on.
“In this case, we knew it was serious. We knew no specifics, apart from the category of the potential offences.”
He added that if Edwards had been charged before he resigned in April, he would have been fired “immediately”.
Edwards was BBC News’ highest paid employee
What images did Edwards have on his phone?
Following his guilty pleas, it emerged Edwards was arrested after officers seized the phone of a paedophile named Alex Williams in an “entirely unrelated investigation”.
When officers from South Wales Police looked at the device they found Williams had sent 41 indecent images to Edwards in a WhatsApp chat between December 2020 and August 2021.
Of those, seven were classified as category A, while 12 were category B and 22 were category C.
The estimated age of most of the children in the category A images was between 13 and 15, a court heard.
However, prosecutors said there were also moving images of young children, possibly aged seven and nine years old among the category A images.
As a result of the original investigation, Williams was convicted of seven offences related to indecent images and prohibited images of children. He was given a suspended 12-month jail sentence at Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court on 15 March.
Source Agencies
