Help and Feedback

This page contains the BBC's responses to editorial, technical and corporate issues. It includes apologies, significant corrections, statements and responses, and findings from the BBC Trust.

It does not include routine corrections to news stories, minor on-air apologies and schedule changes.

In an item dealing with various aspects of the UK Government’s changes to the lockdown regulations for England, it was suggested that police in Wales would not be enforcing the continuing travel restrictions on someone who chose to drive into Wales, following the relaxing of rules in England. While the regulations now differ for people living just a few miles apart, on either side of the border, we have been asked to make clear that the policing of travel restrictions in Wales is continuing.

We received complaints from some viewers about the background information we provided about contributors to this edition of Panorama that dealt with, among other things, the inadequacy of the personal protective equipment (PPE) being provided to frontline NHS staff.

The interviewees in question were all selected on the basis of their direct NHS experience and expertise. 

We spoke to dozens of health care workers during the making of the programme and they all had concerns about the lack of proper PPE. These concerns have also been reflected by the British Medical Association and the Royal Colleges.

None of our interviewees was sourced through a political party, union or professional body. Each was speaking from their own personal experience of providing care to patients with Covid-19. One of our interviewees was a trade union representative and was identified as such in the programme.

One contributor, Dr Sonia Adesara, stood as a Labour candidate in a local election in 2017, and appeared in a Labour Party election broadcast before last year’s election. 

We acknowledge that mentioning this would have helped viewers make their own assessment about her comments, although we do not consider it cast doubt on the validity of her concerns: Panorama established for itself the shortages that concerned her, including the rationing of PPE in high risk areas.

The programme’s revelations about the PPE shortages did not come from any of the contributors and have not been disputed since the programme was broadcast.

In a report that included a photograph of a packed Air Lingus flight, we carried a clip from a BBC Radio Foyle interview with the chief executive of Loganair, Jonathan Hinkles, who spoke about the difficulties of social distancing on aeroplanes. We should make clear that Mr Hinkles was speaking before the news of the Air Lingus flight came out.

In the newspaper review, a contributor, Trevor Phillips, suggested that the Muslim Council of Britain had aligned itself with a group that had called President Obama and the staff of the French magazine Charlie Hebdo Islamaphobes. We’re happy to make clear that the MCB says it is not aligned with this group and does not support these comments.

An interview with our correspondent about the changes to the official PPE guidance over wearing intensive care gowns omitted to mention that this related to England. Healthcare workers were advised to reuse gowns or wear different kit if stocks ran low.

The Scottish and Welsh governments had both indicated that they would not be making changes to their guidance because they had adequate stocks.

In a report about cybercrime during the Coronavirus pandemic we reported that the National Cyber Security Centre has issued new advice on video conferencing software suggesting users make meetings public. The NCSC advice is in fact the opposite, that meetings should be made private.

We reported across different outlets and platforms that a boss of an NHS Trust had contacted the BBC with concerns about the shortage of gowns for the Coronavirus crisis. He had asked us for the phone numbers of Burberry and Barbour - both trying to aid supply.

The person concerned is not in fact the boss of an NHS Trust but part of a network of organisations helping to source personal protective equipment for some Trusts.

The mistake was caused by a misunderstanding of the person’s role in the fight against the pandemic.

During the newspaper review, our guest Phil Hall questioned whether or not the Duchess of Sussex wanted ‘a quiet life’ by referring to a photograph of her in the Daily Telegraph that he said had been taken the previous day. It was in fact taken in 2016.

We reported that Imperial College London had had complaints from staff after a decision to reopen some communal living spaces at the University. Although some staff expressed their concerns directly to the BBC, Imperial itself received no complaints about the move.

We said  “the Scottish government will end its contract with Scotrail early because of poor performance”. 

The contract was actually with Abellio. 

ScotRail is the brand name for all Scottish regional and commuter services.

In a discussion about Labour’s tax plans we said the wealthiest 1% in the UK ‘carry about 27% of the tax base.’ We should have made it clear this was a reference to the proportion of income tax paid by this group, not the total proportion of taxes the top 1% pay overall.

In a report about Coronavirus in Italy the number of deaths was said to be more than 12,000. In fact the total number of deaths to date on that day was 1,441 - up from 1,266 the day before.  

In an interview it was claimed that there were 700,000 homeless deaths in the UK last year. In fact the most recent estimate from the Office for National Statistics for 2018 puts the figure at 726.

An introduction to a report on how businesses are preparing for the impact of coronavirus said a global growth forecast had been cut and “markets again fell”. In fact both the FTSE 100 and the Dow Jones had rebounded from their previous losses on that day.

In a report about the Non Domestic Rates (Scotland) Bill, we wrongly stated that private schools would be losing their charitable status. While the Bill would affect their eligibility for charitable tax rates relief, the status as a charity would remain unchanged.

In an edition of this programme, a panellist claimed Virgin had made a profit of £200m in the NHS in recent years and not paid any tax.

Virgin has contacted us since to point out that the Virgin Care group of companies has never generated a profit overall and no corporation tax has ever been due.

The shadow Business Secretary commented on moves to abolish the post of Deputy Labour leader during Labour’s Party Conference in a BBC interview. Her remarks were paraphrased by our Political Editor who tweeted: "Rebecca Long Bailey told @BBCr4today she voted for the plan to abolish Tom Watson’s position because she didn’t want to ‘stifle democracy.’"

To be clear, she meant that Ms Long Bailey had voted for the motion to be discussed.  

In a report about how the UK might achieve zero carbon emissions, a graph entitled ‘Changing UK Energy Mix’ showed how sources of energy have changed in the UK since 1990. We should have made it clear that the figures related to the UK’s electricity supply only.

The programme included a report about the release of a study from the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR), which found that by 2029 Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal would leave the UK £70bn worse off than if it had remained in the EU.

When introducing this report the newsreader misspoke, inaccurately referring to how the NIESER forecast that the deal would “…leave the UK 70 billion pounds a year worse off”.

We apologise for this error.

On this date, both Today and Newsbeat reported on a letter to the Science journal from conservation biologists which said banning trophy hunting imperils biodiversity. Some months later, the journal published declarations of interest from the authors, including Dr Amy Dickman, who featured in our own programming. Dr Dickman is the Director of the Ruaha Carnivore Project, which has been funded by phototourism (Asilia and Nomad) and in the past from the Dallas Safari Club and Safari Club International.

In a question to a representative of the Muslim Council of Britain about Labour’s Race & Faith manifesto we said there were "no mentions of Islam". While this was intended to be a discussion about whether the document contains specific policies aimed at the Muslim community, we should make clear that it does in fact make references both to Muslims and Islamophobia - for example, the need for a memorial to Muslim soldiers, pay inequality faced by Muslim women and Labour’s adoption of the All Party Parliamentary Group’s definition of Islamophobia.

In a report on the previous night’s Question Time: Leaders Debate, a clip was shortened for timing reasons on Saturday's lunchtime bulletin. This was to edit out a repetitious phrase from Boris Johnson, but in doing so, it also resulted in the audience laughter being removed. Although there was absolutely no intention to mislead, we accept this was a mistake on our part, as it didn't reflect the full reaction to Boris Johnson's answer. We did not alter the soundtrack or image in any way apart from this edit, contrary to some claims on social media. A longer clip, including the audience reaction, was played out in full on BBC News at Ten on Friday evening and on other outlets.

In a discussion about the impact of the Leadership election debate, we said Boris Johnson had said the Royal Family is beyond reproach.

To be precise Boris Johnson had said: 'The institution of the monarchy is beyond reproach.'

In an item about the possible sale of the Daily Telegraph and the Sunday Telegraph, it was claimed the Telegraph is loss making. In fact the Telegraph Media Group made a pre-tax profit of £900,000 on turnover of £271million in 2018.

The Telegraph points out that while its paid-for circulation is 310,586 it also has 400,000 subscribers.

We incorrectly used footage from the Remembrance Day service in 2016. This was a production mistake and we apologise for the error. The footage was among archive we had selected to preview this year’s service but it was used in error on Armistice Day itself, though not in combination with the correct footage. 

The presenter misheard a reference from a member of the audience who said that Vote Leave “is accused of breaking electoral law” and gave the impression that this was not correct.

In fact, Vote Leave was fined £61,000 by the Electoral Commission and a police investigation into its activities during the EU referendum campaign is still active.

Leave.EU, to which the presenter was in fact referring, was also fined for electoral offences.

We incorrectly stated that the Independent Office for Police Conduct had found no evidence of lying or deliberate wrongdoing by the Metropolitan Chief Commissioner Cressida Dick in its review of Operation Midland. The IOPC investigation did not in fact refer to her.

During a report about the decision to scrap a vote to abolish the Labour deputy leader post, our correspondent quoted a tweet that they believed was posted to Tom Watson’s official Twitter profile. However it has come to our attention that the tweet that was quoted in the report was taken from a fake Tom Watson Twitter account.

In a tweet Christian Fraser referred to the stance of three senior Labour party members on Brexit. We should make it clear that he was reflecting his understanding of their personal views, expressed in interviews with them, rather than the party’s official position. One of them, Richard Burgon, has clarified his own position.

In an interview about Labour’s Green New Deal, it was claimed that the GMB General Secretary had described the party’s plans for zero net carbon emissions by 2030 as ‘“negligent at best, vindictive and cruel at its worst”. In fact this was how the GMB’s Tim Roache had described the Government’s approach to the zero carbon economy. Mr Roache has previously said the net zero carbon emissions target for 2030 was “unachievable”.

In this programme, we suggested that Benjamin Netanhayu faces serious allegations of corruption, which he denies, and which were due to come to court next month.

This was in fact a pre-trial hearing in front of the attorney general at the Justice ministry.

In a discussion about abolishing tuition fees it was claimed that Labour are ‘the only ones that have that commitment’ in England.

In fact the Green Party is also committed to abolishing tuition fees.

UKIP says it wants to abolish tuition fees for all when economic to do so. As a first step it will bring back maintenance grants for poor students and scrap fees for medicine and STEM courses.

The Liberal Democrats say they will reintroduce maintenance grants for poor students.

In exchanges about the causes of heavy rain and thunderstorms, high levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and global warming were given as direct factors. Any role for climate change in affecting storm conditions is the subject of ongoing research by the scientific community.

A tweet referring to an interview with the Green Party MP Caroline Lucas about Brexit read: ‘Would Green MP Caroline Lucas accept the result of Brexit referendum where Leave won? “No, I probably wouldn’t”’

In fact Caroline Lucas told Politics Live said that in the short term she would accept the result and that this would settle the issue for the foreseeable future.

The tweet has been deleted and @BBCPolitics has since made clear this was because the original tweet misrepresented what Ms Lucas had said.

We inadvertently implied in this programme that Gaza was under siege, like Aleppo and Sarajevo, rather than under a blockade. We have re-edited this programme to make the difference clear and to provide some more context about the nature of the Gaza blockade and the reasons for it.

In a report about the Pentagon’s plans to enter into a contract with a commercial company to store  classified data on the cloud (the JEDI contract), we raised security concerns in relation to the close relationship one of the main front runners for the contract, Amazon Web Services, had with the C5 group of cyber-investment companies.

The BBC’s Executive Complaint’s Unit has partially upheld a complaint from AWS. The ECU said that the evidence relied upon 'did not justify the clear impression that the relationship between AWS and C5 Group did create a threat to US national security in the event AWS were to be awarded the JEDI contract.’ 

As a result we have taken the article down.

In a report about cases of anti-Semitism within the Labour Party, our correspondent said according to party figures, "the number of allegations only concern 0.6% of the party membership."

In fact Labour says the correct figure is 0.06%.

In an interview about nutrition, reference was made to a study which showed people who drank sugared and diet soda put on weight, people who drank milk saw no change, while people who drank water lost weight. The study referred to was a February 2012 report in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. One of the co-authors asked us to make clear that in fact this is incorrect as the research revealed no statistically significant change in body weight during the trial for any of the groups monitored. 

In a story of one woman’s experience with vaccinations, we interviewed ‘Meredith’ who believed that the frightening illnesses she was experiencing as an adult were the result of her mother deciding not to get her vaccinated as a child.

When further investigations revealed that Meredith had not been treated for tetanus in hospital in Queensland, we decided to withdraw the story from the website. In fact Meredith was hospitalised with suspected tetanus, but doctors later identified a different infection.

In a discussion about new research on how gambling companies promote their services on Twitter, we incorrectly stated that X-Bet.co didn’t respond to our request for comment. They did respond, saying: “We condemn any form of underage gambling and we adhere to the most stringent regulation enforcing this. This is clearly defined in the terms and conditions of our site. Furthermore we do not accept users from the United Kingdom.”

In a report about drugs crime figures and county lines, we referred to the village of Westhumble in Surrey where figures show there’s been an increase in drugs offences in the past year. Surrey police have confirmed these cases relate to drugs possession in the surrounding area and are not gang related. Westhumble is not a centre for county lines dealing and we accept it should not have featured in reports about how drugs gangs are moving away from cities and into less densely populated areas.

(Updated 12th September 2019)

In a report on the Swedish investigation into the rape allegations against Julian Assange being reopened, our presenter referred to charges against him. While there have been allegations made against Mr Assange, he has never been charged.

In a discussion about Labour’s policies, a guest asserted that Labour MP Ellie Reeves was facing possible deselection in her seat of Lewisham West and Penge.

We have been asked to point out that one member of the constituency Labour Party had asked for a vote of no confidence in Ms Reeves but no such motion was moved at the CLP's general meeting. Ms Reeves has publicly thanked members of the CLP for the support for her expressed at the meeting.

In an interview about the proposed London Resort Project, the Chief Executive of the London Resort Company Holdings (LRCH) said LRCH has an option over ALL the land required in order to progress the project.

In fact LRCH controls 80% of the land required and discussions with interested parties and landowners are ongoing.

As part of our D-Day coverage we mistakenly referred to an army vehicle as a World War Two Land Rover. In fact Land Rover did not start production until 1948, after the Second World War.

In a question to one of its directors, we stated that the TV chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall blamed the chemical firm Ineos for plastic waste found on a Grangemouth beach.

The company denied it was responsible, but in fact Mr Fearnley-Whittingstall had not said this. We’ve amended the BBC Sounds edition of the programme and a BBC News Online article has also been changed.

In a report on local disciplinary procedures within the Labour Party, it was incorrectly stated that Union official, Sian Bloor, had been “readmitted” to the Party. While Ms Bloor received a sanction during an investigation, her membership status had not changed during the investigation.

In a report on the Work and Pensions Select Committee evidence session in Parliament, we reported that some vulnerable people faced difficulties accessing Universal Credit because claims have to be done online. The Department for Work and Pensions has asked us to point out that this is not the case as claims can also be submitted on the phone or via home visits that can be arranged on request.

In a report about smart meters, we said up to £1.7 billion had been spent on installing meters that are not working as they should.

This figure is wrong and should not have been included in the report. It was calculated from the overall projected cost of the entire smart meter project rather than the cost to date, and did not take into account the fact that the roll out of smart meters is less than half way through.

We also said that the second generation of smart meters are not able to switch between suppliers. In fact, the second generation of smart meters should be able to function with a different supplier.

In an edition of this programme, David Lammy MP said the Windrush Compensation Scheme was “heavily capped when people make individual claims. So for example, if you’ve been deported you have a cap of £10,000.” While this figure is accurate, the adviser to the scheme has asked us to point out that applicants can make claims under multiple categories and there is no overall cap on the amount of compensation an individual can receive.

In a discussion on a report about changes to the environment by the Institute for Public Policy Research, reference was made to an IPPR statistic that since 2005, the number of floods across the world has increased by 15 times.

The IPPR has since corrected their report to say that this is, in fact, since 1950.  

We are happy to make this clear.

BBC Radio 4's Today programme discussed the accuracy of claims made about food poisoning in the UK compared to the US. In doing so, we wrongly compared US estimated figures with UK confirmed figures. The following article on the topic has been updated with additional statistics and now gives more context around this issue: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47440562

In an item about the Sackler Trust, we reported its decision to suspend future gifts to charities in light of the controversy over money it received which derived from the sale of opioid painkillers.

Commenting on this, an interviewee referred to 300,000 people having died in America.

We would like to make clear this was a reference to the overall number of deaths linked to opioids in general, and not deaths linked to a specific product or company. According to the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, almost 400,000 people died between 1999 and 2017 in the USA from an overdose involving any opioid.

In our News at Ten bulletin and in an online article published on 23 May 2018 we incorrectly reported that Petro Poroshenko, the President of Ukraine, had procured or authorised a corrupt payment of $400,000 to be made to Michael Cohen, the personal lawyer of Donald Trump, to extend a brief meeting between Mr Poroshenko and President Trump, that had already been agreed, into more substantial talks.

We believed that the publications made a less serious allegation against Mr Poroshenko, but in the light of a finding by the High Court that the allegation was as set out above, we are happy to accept that this allegation was untrue. We apologise to Mr Poroshenko for any distress caused and have agreed to pay him damages, legal costs and have participated in a joint statement in open court.

In an interview with Shamima Begum’s husband, we incorrectly stated that in the UK, “sex with someone under 16 is statutory rape.”

In fact, that charge does not exist in UK Law. The Sexual Offences Act 2003 instead refers to this as "sexual activity with a child".

We said, “At the moment, offshore wind is now £57.50 per MWH”. We should clarify that we meant to specify that this is the current estimated cost for 2022-2023.

Though a YouGov poll published on the day of the programme suggested a lead for the Conservatives, Diane Abbott was right to describe the overall situation as “kind of level pegging”, and we should not have described Labour as “definitely” behind on the basis of a single poll. We should always report voting intention polls in the context of trend.

This correction was amended on 18 April 2019 following a finding by the Executive Complaints Unit

We said that “over the past few decades… four fifths of Iraq's Christians have fled or been killed; in Israel and the Palestinian territories, as those following other religions have grown sharply in number, the Christian population has shrunk.” In the region as a whole, numbers are certainly continuing to fall. But in recent times particularly Israel’s Christian population has increased - for example, in 2017, by 2.2%.

The headlines reported the Prime Minister as saying that her plan was the only realistic one and the only way to avoid "crashing out" of the EU without a deal.

We should clarify this phrase was used in the debate by several MPs but not by the Prime Minister.