The head of the BBC has been summoned for talks with the Culture Secretary amid concerns over how “serious and concerning” allegations against a presenter have been handled.
Secretary of State Lucy Frazer held urgent talks with Director General Tim Davie today over allegations that a senior presenter paid a teenager for sexually explicit photos.
Officials at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport had already spoken to the BBC to seek assurances all the allegations are being dealt with appropriately, i understands.
Tweeting following the call, Ms Frazer said Mr Davie had assured her the claims would be investigated “swiftly and sensitively”.
She said: “Given the nature of the allegations it is important that the BBC is now given the space to conduct its investigation, establish the facts and take appropriate action. I will be kept updated.”
It comes after reports in The Sun that the family of the teenager made the complaint to the broadcaster several weeks ago – but the presenter was not immediately taken off air.
A No10 source said the BBC would “want to act swiftly on these reports to bring clarity for all those involved” and a Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) spokesperson said the BBC would have to prove it was handling the allegations appropriately.
“These allegations are deeply concerning. As a public service broadcaster in receipt of public funding, senior officials have stressed to the BBC that the allegations must be investigated urgently and sensitively, with the department kept informed,” a spokeswoman said.
The well-known male presenter has been accused of paying a vulnerable teenager £35,000 for sexual images, with payments beginning when the individual was 17, according to The Sun.
It has also been suggested that the money sent by the presenter was used to fuel the person’s addiction to drugs.
The newspaper reported that the young person’s mother saw a picture of the presenter on her child’s phone in which he was “sitting on a sofa in his house in his underwear”.
She said she was told it was “a picture from some kind of video call”.
Government minister Victoria Atkins called on the BBC to act “very swiftly” to investigate the unnamed presenter.
“These are very, very serious allegations and the BBC have said they have processes in place,” the financial secretary to the Treasury told Sky’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme.
“But as public attention and concern grows the BBC is going to have to act very swiftly to deal with these allegations and to set out what they are doing to investigate them,” she added.
