Sex and drugs and phone-in rip-offs

Phone-in rip-off (2007)

The BBC issued an apology yesterday after Blue Peter became the latest programme to be tainted by a live studio phone-in scandal.The Corporation admitted that the results of the competition had been faked after a "serious error of judgement".

Viewers were invited to call a premium rate competition line during a live programme to win a toy. But due to a "technical failure", a telephone caller was not selected and a member of staff asked a child who was visiting the studio to phone in and give their answer instead. That child was awarded the prize.

Richard Deverell, BBC children's controller, said it was a "serious error of judgement" after a complaint was made by a member of the public.

He added: "I would like to apologise unequivocally to viewers, to all the children who took part in the competition, and we have already apologised directly to the child involved and her family for this incident."

As a consequence, the BBC set up an immediate review of the process for conducting live competitions on Children's BBC and ordered "intensive staff training" on the issues involved.

Jana Bennett, director of BBCVision, also announced a senior level independent review of the circumstances surrounding the competition. "Blue Peter enjoys the highest reputation for its relationship of trust and respect for the audience. It is disappointing, therefore, that there has been a serious breach of editorial standards on a live edition of the programme.

"I believe the action that is being taken by BBC Children's will help to reassure children and parents that we take this matter very seriously indeed, " she said.

The BBC did not make a profit from the 10p calls and 3.25p from each phone-in went to Unicef. The competition to raise money for the Blue Peter Appeal in aid of Unicef took place during a live edition of the show on 27 November. A viewer contacted the BBC last Friday alleging that the winning call had been made by a child visiting the studio, after which the Corporation commissioned a report.

Findings of the report read: "The preliminary report has established that there was a technical failure during this live programme. The calls were being received correctly by the telecoms operator but the studio staff were having difficulty retrieving the information as originally planned. This meant that a caller was not selected to give their answer on air, as was promised at the beginning of the programme.

"A member of staff then asked a child, who was visiting the studio, to phone in to the programme and to give an answer on air. The child was awarded the prize."

Blue Peter's editor, Richard Marson, said: "We are absolutely committed to running competitions that are fair to all entrants and we are very sorry for the way this competition was conducted."

A new winner will be randomly selected from the 27 November entrants under the supervision of an independent solicitor, the BBC said. The matter has also been referred to premium rate phone line regulator, Icstis. Icstis said in a statement: that it "welcomes the fact that the BBC has brought this matter to its attentionand the broadcaster's proposals to remedy the situation."

It added: "Icstis has a duty to investigate any potential breaches of its Code of Practice that are brought to its attention. This is what it will now be doing."

But some television standards campaigners said faking a winner on a children's show marked a new low. Dave Turtle, from the pressure group, Mediawatch UK, called for a "full investigation into these phone lines".

Blue Peter is the latest show tobe tainted by the phone-in scandal, which began last month when it emerged that callers to Channel 4's Richard And Judy show were urged to call in for the You Say, We Pay game despite the fact that contestants had already been chosen. Since then, a number of shows have come under scrutiny, including Saturday Kitchen, I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! and X-Factor.

Janet's baby bust-up 1987

Janet Ellis, one of the most popular children's presenters of her era, left Blue Peter in June 1987, after a four year tenure, to have her second child, amid rumours she had been sacked because she was not married to the father. Since then however, she has confirmed she was not forced out but that it was her decision to leave.

In an interview withThe Sunday Times in 2004, she said: "Nobody was thinking it was a scandal that I hadn't married. In fact, I announced my pregnancy in January and carried on presenting Blue Peter - with an ever-widening girth - until June.The bump was clear for everyone to see. It's just a shame that the myth has been perpetuated for so long."

Contrary to popular public belief, the child in question was not her pop singer daughter, Sophie Ellis-Bextor, who was born eight years earlier.

Some have said her tenure already had its problems, not least because she had taken over from Sarah Greene, one of the most successful presenters ever on the show.

In spite of Ellis' insistence that she did not face any censure after her pregnancy revelation, Blue Peter's producer, Edward Barnes, remembers otherwise. In an unauthorised book on Blue Peter, he remembers Biddy Baxter, erupting with rage after Ellis announced her pregnancy on air.

"When Janet revealed her pregnancy to the viewers, Biddy Baxter exploded in the gallery. I've never seen anyone so angry. She began smashing monitors and gnashing her teeth. It was actually quite terrifying, and I'm glad that I was well out of her way. I wasn't quite sure what was wrong, until I realised that Janet was not married. To Biddy's Victorian morality, this was obscene and quite the wrong thing for children to be watching. She went down to the studio floor and even as the closing credits were rolling, began verbally abusing Janet."

The Petra deception 1962

It took more than three decades for the truth to emerge but when it finally did the viewing public were scandalised to learn they had been quite literally sold a pup. Petra, the original and perhaps best loved of the Blue Peter pets, was not who she appeared to be. In 1962 the show's audience was introduced to a cute little mongrel puppy and asked to come up with a name. But a few days after her first TV appearance the dog developed distemper and died. The programme's editor, Biddy Baxter, it was claimed, decreed that it was quite inappropriate for the young audience to be availed of the harsh facts of life and death at such a tender age.

A similar-looking replacement was found and the vote went ahead. Petra, as she was named, went on to be idolised by the audience and when she died was immortalised with a bust that stood in front of TV centre, although it was eventually moved to the Blue Peter garden.

Petra's second "master", the presenter Peter Purves was less taken with the dog than the general public. He recalled: "She was immensely popular but she didn't have much personality. She'd had distemper, lost her teeth, developed diabetes, her eyes were bad and she was neurotic and badly bred. An accident. A mess. People imagined she was a German Shepherd, but she was some rough collie cross. She hated the studio."

Bacon and drugs1998

In October1998, Blue Peter had just celebrated its 40th birthday, and was about to collect a prize at the British Academy Children's Awards in recognition of its "outstanding contribution to children's television".Then it was reported that a presenter, Richard Bacon, had ended a 12-hour drinking session by snorting cocaine.

Bacon was sacked - becoming the first BP presenter to lose his job for such a crime - and his fellow presenters (Konnie Huq, Stuart Miles andKaty Hill) were quizzed about their colleague as they arrived for the awards. The BBC's then head of children's programmes, Lorraine Heggessey, went on screen to explain to viewers why Bacon was fired. " He has not only let himself and the team down, but he has let you all down," she said.

Bacon tried to keep things in perspective. "Where I stand is that I've done this, I am sorry, but it's really nothing to do with being a children's presenter. I'm not Jack The Ripper. I want to lie low for a while and then rebuild my career."

He has done precisely that, with a show on BBC Radio Five Live.

Garden vandals 1983

Former England striker Les Ferdinand cast a dim ray of light on a mystery which had endured for 17 years when he admitted playing a part in the ransacking of the Blue Peter garden.

The episode after the attack in November 1983 opened with a series of still photos of the devastation, before presenter Janet Ellis broke the silence to tell viewers that vandals had broken in and caused havoc.

The ornamental sundial in the Italian sunken garden had been tipped up and shattered into pieces, an urn had been dumped in the pond and the water had been polluted with oil, killing the goldfish. Plants had been uprooted and flung about.

The sight of the damage brought tears to the eyes of Blue Peter gardener Percy Thrower, who said that in his opinion the perpetrators must have been " mentally ill".

Mr Ferdinand, who played for QPR, Newcastle and Spurs during a career that included 17 England caps, confessed to his minor involvement in 2002.

"What I will say is I helpeda few people over the wall," he told the BBC Choice programme 45 Minutes.

The BBC was keen to stress that he did not say he was directly involved with the vandalism.

Elephant trouble1969

How they all adored Lulu, the baby Sri Lankan elephant from Chessington Zoo. John Noakes, Peter Purves and Valerie Singleton, that most legendary of Blue Peter lineups, had visited said zoo in 1969 to seal a sponsorship deal with the creature and a few weeks later came the return visit in which Lulu, escorted by her keeper Alec, would be paraded around the BP studio and receive her obligatory BP badge. No one anticipated the now classic, unscripted consequences.

Alarmed by the bright lightsand alien environment, the elephant decided to relieve herself on the floor before dragging the zookeeper over, standing on John Noakes' foot and heading for the exit. John then accidentally stepped in the dung, prompting the most memorable line in his long BP stint: "Oh dear, I've trodden right in it." It has become one of the most requested clips of all time and was voted third in a list of great TV animal moments commissioned by a pet accessories company a few years back.

Purves still blames producer Biddy Baxter. " Lulu drank and she peed, poohed and generally misbehaved - dragging her poor keeper through the mess," he recalled recently. "Val gamely struggled to keep us all on the script, but John and I could not stop laughing. Biddy had asked the keeper to do without the stick he used to keep Lulu under control. Without it Lulu did exactly what she wanted."