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Peter William Rippon (born 22 August 1965) is a British broadcasting executive. He is the editor of the BBC Online Archive. He was previously the editor of BBC Television's current affairs programme Newsnight , but he departed due to the controversy over his decision not to broadcast a posthumous investigation into the sexual abuse allegations against Jimmy Savile.
Rippon was born in Henley-on-Thames. [1] He is the son of Robin Rippon and Susan Westcott. He has an older sister and younger brother and sister.
Rippon attended the Gillotts School, [1] a comprehensive school, in Henley on Thames in the South Oxfordshire district of south-eastern Oxfordshire.
Rippon graduated from the University of East Anglia (UEA) with a BA in Philosophy and Politics, [2] and gained an MSc in International Politics [3] from the University of Southampton.
Rippon joined the BBC in 1989 as a trainee. At Radio 4 he became (concurrently) the editor of The World At One , PM , iPM , Broadcasting House and The World This Weekend . He has also edited Newshour for the BBC World Service. Rippon's programmes have won numerous awards including Sony Gold in 2007 for interactivity for PM. [4]
Moving into television, on 7 November 2008 he was appointed the editor of Newsnight. [5] The previous editor, Peter Barron, became Head of PR for Google in the UK.
In 2011, it was found by BARB that the Newsnight audience was on average around 450,000.[ citation needed ] Ten years previously it was around 1 million. When Rippon was editor, Newsnight was named news programme of the year by the Royal Television Society (2012). It also won Emmy (2009, 2011) and Peabody (2010) awards under his leadership.
In late 2011, Rippon spiked [6] an item about the history of the suspected paedophile Jimmy Savile on Newsnight. [7] Rippon argued that the decision was in part based on the Crown Prosecution Service reporting a lack of evidence. Internal emails revealed that his concern was over the fact that the only evidence was from "the women". His editor's blog gives the background of why he, at the time, came to the conclusions that he did. [8] In October 2012, Rippon stepped aside from his role as editor pending an independent review into his decision to drop the investigation into Savile. [9] The Pollard Review into the incident investigated the decision exhaustively. [10] It concluded that Rippon's decision not to air the item was "flawed" but "done in good faith" and without undue pressure from his bosses. Rippon disagreed that his evidence was flawed, setting out his reasons in evidence to the inquiry. [11] In October 2012, the chairman of the BBC Trust, Lord Patten, when interviewed on Radio 4's The Media Show about the Savile affair, remarked "Peter Rippon is a very distinguished editor who broke the story about service companies which we've been having to deal with ever since." [12]
Newsnight is the BBC's news and current affairs programme, providing in-depth investigation and analysis of the stories behind the day's headlines. The programme is broadcast on weekdays at 22:30 on BBC Two and the UK feed of BBC News channel; it is also available on BBC iPlayer.
Sir James Wilson Vincent Savile was an English media personality and DJ. He hosted the BBC shows Top of the Pops and Jim'll Fix It. During his lifetime, Savile was well known in the United Kingdom for his eccentric image and charitable work. After his death, hundreds of allegations of sexual abuse made against him were investigated, leading the police to conclude that he had been a predatory sex offender and possibly one of Britain's most prolific. There had been allegations during his lifetime, but they were dismissed and accusers ignored or were disbelieved.
Sir Mark John Thompson is a British media executive who is Chairman of the Board of Directors of Ancestry, the largest for-profit genealogy company in the world, and Chief Executive Officer of the Cable News Network (CNN). He is the former president and chief executive officer of The New York Times Company. From 2004 to 2012, he served as Director-General of the BBC, and before that was the Chief Executive of Channel 4. In 2009 Thompson was ranked as the 65th most powerful person in the world by Forbes magazine. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2017.
This article outlines, in chronological order, the various controversies surrounding or involving the BBC.
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) took its present form on 1 January 1927 when John Reith became its first Director-General. Reith stated that impartiality and objectivity were the essence of professionalism in broadcasting.
Jonathan B. Sopel is a British journalist, television presenter and a former correspondent for BBC News. He was formerly the BBC's North America editor; chief political correspondent for the domestic news channel BBC News; a presenter on the Politics Show on BBC One and the BBC News channel; and from 2013 to 2014, the main presenter of Global on BBC World News.
Evan Harold Davis is an English journalist, presenter for the BBC, and former economist. He has presented Dragons' Den since 2005, and PM since 2018.
Helen Boaden is a British former broadcasting executive who spent more than 30 years working for the BBC, including as Director of Radio between February 2013 and September 2016.
The BBC Trust was the governing body of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) between 2007 and 2017. It was operationally independent of BBC management and external bodies, and its stated aim was to make decisions in the best interests of licence-fee payers. On 12 May 2016, it was announced in the House of Commons that, under the next royal charter, the regulatory functions of the BBC Trust were to be transferred to Ofcom.
Allegra Elizabeth Jane Stratton is a British former political aide, journalist, and writer who served as Downing Street Press Secretary under Boris Johnson from November 2020 to April 2021.
Meirion Jones is a Welsh journalist. He worked for the BBC from 1988 until 2015 and is now the editor of the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Former Newsnight presenter Jeremy Paxman described Jones as "a dogged journalist with that obsessional, slightly nutty commitment that marks out all successful investigative reporters".
George Edward Entwistle is a former broadcasting executive, who was Director-General of the BBC during 2012, succeeding Mark Thompson. After a career in magazine journalism, he joined BBC Television in 1989, becoming a producer with a primary focus on factual and political programmes. He rose to become the director of BBC Vision, and became the Director-General of the BBC on 17 September 2012.
It emerged in late 2012 that Jimmy Savile, an English media personality who had died the previous year, sexually abused hundreds of people throughout his life, most of them children but some as old as 75, and most of them female. He had been well known in the United Kingdom for his eccentric image and was generally respected for his charitable work, which associated him with the British monarchy and other individuals of personal power.
George Nicholas Pollard is a British journalist and the former head of Sky News.
In 2012 and 2013, the British Broadcasting Corporation was involved in a series of investigations, accusations and scandals related to sexual abuse committed by employees, and the reporting of allegations of abuse by others. The issue of child sexual abuse by BBC employees was publicised nationally in October 2012 as part of the Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal. Savile was a radio DJ and TV personality who presented the programmes Top of the Pops, Jim'll Fix It and Clunk Click, and was a well known charity fundraiser. Allegations of sexual abuse by Savile and other BBC employees were reported to have taken place in a number of locations across the country, including BBC Television Centre.
Elizabeth Mary MacKean was a British television reporter and presenter. She worked on the BBC's Newsnight programme and was the reporter on an exposé of Sir Jimmy Savile as a paedophile which was controversially cancelled by the BBC in December 2011. The decision to axe the Newsnight investigation became the subject of the Pollard Inquiry. She and colleague Meirion Jones later won a London Press Club Scoop of the Year award for their work on the story. She also won the 2010 Daniel Pearl Award for her investigation of the Trafigura toxic dumping scandal.
Giving Victims a Voice is a report published in January 2013, relating to allegations of sexual abuse made against English DJ and BBC Television presenter Jimmy Savile (1926–2011) as part of the Operation Yewtree criminal investigation. It was initiated as a result of publicity surrounding the Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal. The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) jointly produced this report. It marked the end of investigations made under the operation regarding Savile alone.
Ian Alexander Katz is a British journalist and broadcasting executive who is currently Chief Content Officer at Channel 4, overseeing all editorial decision making and commissioning across Channel 4's linear channels, streaming services and social media.
Miles Goslett is a journalist. He has worked for the Evening Standard, the Sunday Telegraph and the Mail on Sunday. He was the U.K. editor for Heat Street.