A BBC charity, which takes tens of millions from the taxpayer, fired six members of staff for sexual misconduct without informing the government.
BBC Media Action, which works to influence journalistic practices around the world, got rid of the employees for sexual harassment and watching pornography on work computers.
The organisation did not disclose any of the incidents to ministers, despite accepting £70 million from the Department for International Development (DfiD) between 2012 and 2017.
The revelations come after the Oxfam scandal and widespread allegations of sexual predators working inside charities, aid groups, and non-governmental organisation (NGOs) to take advantage of vulnerable women and children.
In a statement, the BBC charity said: “We have reviewed all cases in the last 10 years involving or potentially involving sexual misconduct. Six such cases have been identified over this period, all of which were investigated.”
“In two of these, no grounds were found to take any disciplinary action.
“In the remaining four, formal disciplinary action was taken. None involved beneficiaries and we are not aware of any child protection issues. A total of six people were dismissed for sexual harassment or for watching pornography on work computers.”
A DfID spokesman said: “DfID does not have a record of any sexual misconduct allegations relating to BBC Media Action on our Counter Fraud and Whistleblowing system.”
The BBC told Breitbart London: “BBC Media Action’s valuable work supports and trains journalists in countries with underdeveloped media, helping tackle problems such as Ebola and the Rohingya refugee crisis.
“The charity’s work also helps promote British values of free speech, impartiality and effective democratic scrutiny around the world. The charity is not funded by the licence fee and has its own safeguarding policy in place. As an independent charity BBC Media Action has a governance process in place where cases of this nature are reported to its Trustees after being investigated by Management, which is the appropriate action.”
Pauline Latham, a Tory MP and member of the International Development select committee, said the revelations were “shocking” and accused the BBC of not learning from the Jimmy Savile paedophile scandal.
“This is as shocking as anything else I have heard,” she told The Telegraph.
“You would have thought that after what the BBC has been through with Jimmy Savile they would have cleaned up their act, and been much more wary of what is happening in anything with their name on it.”
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.