LONDON (Parliament Politics Magazine) – The BBC has formally apologised and paid a “substantial sum” in compensation to the Princess of Wales’s aide Patrick Jephson for the manner Martin Bashir got his 1995 Panorama interview.
The network stated in the statement that it “acknowledges and accepts that serious harm” was done to Mr. Jephson as a consequence of the events surrounding the interview of Princess Diana.
Following the publishing of the Dyson report, which also criticised the procedures used to get the explosive interview, a deal was struck, according to the statement.
The BBC buried the “deceiving behaviour” employed by Mr Bashir to get his exclusive interview of Princess Diana, according to a study released last year.
Mr. Jephson plans to donate the entire “significant sum in compensation” to British nonprofits, according to the BBC.
Princess Diana’s interview by Martin Bashir made international news when she talked about her marriage to Prince Charles and memorably remarked, “Well, there were 3 of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded” – a subtle reference to Camilla.When the journalist fabricated bank records and handed them to Earl Spencer to obtain access to the princess, he was deemed to be in severe breach of the BBC’s producer rules, according to the report.
Lord Dyson, who led the independent probe, discovered that top BBC officials covered up Bashir’s falsehoods in a 1996 investigation.
According to Andrew Morton, Princess Diana’s biographer, Mr. Bashir obtained the interview because he scared her nearly to death and convinced her that MI5 was monitoring her, so she did it because she feared she was in danger.
Following Lord Dyson’s findings, Prince William stated that the interview significantly contributed to his mother’s “paranoia, fear, and isolation,” and that the show should never be aired again.
According to reports, the Panorama interview will be recreated in the upcoming Netflix show The Crown.
