Interesting story in the Mail on Sunday, which once again touches upon Roger Harrabin and CMEP.
MPs have demanded that the BBC reveals details of all commercial deals its journalists have with other organisations, amid fears of an increasing number of conflicts of interest affecting their work.
The Corporation is under pressure following The Mail on Sunday’s disclosure two weeks ago that senior BBC journalist Roger Harrabin accepted £15,000 in grants from the University of East Anglia, which was at the heart of the ‘Climategate’ scandal, and then reported on the story without declaring this interest to viewers.
Under BBC rules, employees must register shareholdings, outside corporate work, voluntary positions, book contracts and relevant interests of family members and partners. But the BBC has refused to make public details of the register, despite a Freedom of Information request from this newspaper.
For the avoidance of doubt, there is no suggestion that Harrabin has profited personally from his work on the Cambridge Media and Environment Programme, but the payments from the University of East Anglia were clearly relevant to his journalistic independence, and of course the work of CMEP makes a nonsense of the whole idea of the BBC having any integrity.
The idea that their register of journalists' interests should be a secret document is so absurd as almost to defy belief.