BBC Trust investigating Alan Yentob over his interventions on behalf of Kids Company

BBC Trust investigating whether Yentob compromised the Corporation’s editorial independence through his interventions

Alan Yentob told a select committee last week he regretted any possibility that he was ‘intimidating’ (PA)

The BBC Trust is investigating whether Alan Yentob compromised the Corporation’s editorial independence through his interventions on behalf of the Kids Company charity.

Rona Fairhead, BBC Trust chair, said the body’s editorial standards committee was in discussions with Director-General Tony Hall over suggestions that Mr Yentob, the BBC’s creative director, had abused his position as chairman of the London charity, which was forced to close.

Mr Yentob admitted that he had stood next to a Radio 4 producer when the charity’s founder, Camila Batmanghelidjh, was interviewed on the Today programme. “If it was intimidating, I regret it,” he told MPs last week.

Mr Yentob also called a Newsnight figure, thought to be editor Ian Katz, to ask him to delay a report criticising the financial management at Kids Company, and contacted Ed Stourton, the Radio 4 presenter, before a report on The World at One.

The BBC executive has compiled a report into Mr Yentob’s interventions and assured the Trust that Mr Yentob had not compromised the BBC’s independence – but the Trust is still considering the matter. Speaking at the Society of Editors conference, Ms Fairhead said: “What we at the Trust have to be concerned about is, was the editorial independence of the BBC compromised?

“We have asked the executive for the reassurance that it was not, and they have come back and replied that in their view, it was not. All I can say is if you look at the BBC’s coverage, nobody could say it wasn’t covered fully and deeply, at least as fully as by others. From a Trust’s point of view, that’s what matters.”

Ms Fairhead was challenged at the conference by Simon Bucks, a former Sky News executive, who said the affair “undermines journalistic integrity” at the BBC. He asked: “I don’t understand why the BBC Trust cannot simply say it is unacceptable for a BBC executive to interfere in any matter which is outside their own remit. Surely you should be able to do that and you would expect the management of the BBC to say that?”

Ms Fairhead said it was appropriate for Mr Yentob to speak on behalf of Kids Company, as its chair. But she added he could not “act in a way which would undermine the editorial integrity of the BBC and that is the judgement that everybody is trying to make here.”

The assurances sought from the Trust that Mr Yentob did not cross a line with his advocacy of Kids Company may not satisfy those who want to see him removed from his post.

A BBC spokesperson said: "Our journalism has retained its integrity throughout – indeed we have led on the story – and we have stated this publicly on more than one occasion.”