Princess Diana’s brother has urged incoming BBC boss Matt Brittin to ‘lance the boil’ and shatter the ‘conspiracy of silence’ over the Martin Bashir scandal.
Earl Spencer called on the corporation to appoint an official historian and task him or her with poring over every document related to the deception used by the rogue reporter to land his infamous 1995 Panorama interview with Diana – and the BBC’s subsequent cover-up.
He also renewed his call for Scotland Yard to investigate any revelations of criminality.
Bashir showed Earl Spencer forged bank statements to gain access to Diana and then tricked her by peddling a string of lies, including that Prince William’s watch had been bugged to record her conversations.
Earl Spencer discussed the scandal at the Althorp Literary Festival, held on his estate in Northamptonshire, with investigative journalist Andy Webb, who wrote a book about Bashir’s deception and the BBC’s years-long cover-up.
He backed calls by Webb for the BBC to reinstate its official historian, a position that appears to have been vacant for more than a decade.
The BBC’s official written history, which is detailed across six volumes, is believed to stop in 1987.
Webb fought to obtain more than 10,000 documents from the corporation, albeit with more than 3,000 redactions, but the author believes there is more evidence which is yet to be revealed.
The Panorama interview was hailed at the time as the scoop of a generation
Diana didn’t shy away from Bashir’s hard-hitting questions, going against the Palace’s unspoken rule about remaining quiet
Princess Diana’s younger brother Earl Spencer (pictured) has called on the BBC to appoint an official historian and task him or her with poring over every document related to the deception used by the rogue reporter to land his infamous 1995 Panorama interview with Diana
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Earl Spencer said on Saturday: ‘I endorse what Andy said. I do think to get the official historian back would be a very good idea.
‘I think actually to lance the boil and over time the conspiracy of silence and just brush this all out once and for all. And for the police, to act on what is flushed out.’
He described Bashir as a ‘compulsive liar’, adding: ‘I wouldn’t really want to give him the time of day is the honest truth.’
He branded Bashir’s interview ‘the worst piece of journalism I’ve seen’ and said there were ‘five suspects’ with senior jobs in the BBC who, he claimed, oversaw the cover-up of the scandal.
Meanwhile, Webb revealed that William was among the first readers of his book, Dianarama, when it was published last year.
He said: ‘It was made very clear to me that this does matter, very much, to Prince William, very much indeed. He read almost the first copy of the book off the press and of course it would matter.’
The BBC said it had accepted the findings of a 2021 report into the scandal and had publicly apologised for its part in its conclusions.
