Quick, throw another DJ on the bonfire

So now it’s Tony Blackburn’s turn in the ducking stool. it was only a matter of time. After the death of ed ‘ Stewpot’ Stewart, Blackburn’s one of the last of the original Radio 1 disc jockeys still standing.

officially, he has been sacked by the BBC for refusing to co-operate fully with the Jimmy Savile inquiry. He outed himself on the eve of the publication of Dame Janet Smith’s report in an attempt to protect his reputation.

it’s alleged that back in 1971 he was interviewed by BBC bosses in connection with an allegation that he sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl, who subsequently took her own life. Blackburn not only denies any sexual misconduct, he says he was never quizzed by any executive in connection with such an allegation.

An inquest into the girl’s death and a police investigation made no suggestion that he was guilty of any crime. neither does Dame Janet’s official report. But he was told by director-general Tony Hall that his contract was being terminated because his version of events didn’t tally with the official BBC records.

Blackburn is simply the latest celebrity to have his career ruined and reputation trashed in the febrile atmosphere fuelled by the Savile scandal. Jimmy Tarbuck, Jim Davidson and Paul Gambaccini are just three of the innocent radio and TV personalities who have been hung out to dry.

GIVEN the Paedos in High Places hysteria, stoked by the police and the nonce Finder General Tom Watson, anyone who questions the existence of widespread sexual abuse is guilty of heresy.

The safest option is to keep throwing bodies on the pyres, regardless of proof. Tony Blackburn is more collateral damage.

Retired judge Dame Janet interviewed 375 witnesses and produced a 372,400-word report on the Savile affair. Her most alarming conclusion is that there is still the possibility that another paedophile scandal could be about to unfold at the BBC.

Really? Where’s the evidence for that? There isn’t any. Perhaps she lobbed it in to justify the cost of what Savile’s victims have rightly condemned as a £10 million whitewash.

it’s about the only surprising finding in the entire report. Dame Janet has conveniently concluded that no one at the top of the BBC could be held responsible for decades of sex abuse on the Corporation’s premises. Maybe that’s because not a single senior executive was compelled to give evidence.

Dame Janet does say that a number of opportunities to stop Savile in his tracks were missed. She identifies a culture in which staff with misgivings about Savile were told: ‘Keep your mouth shut, he’s a VIP.’

But, then, we knew that already. ever since the dam burst in the wake of Savile’s death, his victims have been coming forward to complain that no one would listen to them.

everyone at the BBC, from esther Rantzen to the tea lady at Broadcasting House, had apparently heard the rumours, but nobody could produce any concrete proof that Savile was raping and molesting children under their noses.

Dame Janet uncovered a culture of cover-up dating back to 1959, and Savile was still assaulting women as late as 2006, yet she is reluctant to attribute blame to those who were in charge at the time.

A parallel report into Stuart Hall, also published yesterday, does name one former BBC manager, Ray Colley. He is said to have turned a blind eye to Hall’s abuse of women when they worked alongside each other in Manchester.

Colley is now 86. Coincidentally, Dame Janet Smith was initially approached to conduct the Stuart Hall inquiry, but had to withdraw because of a conflict of interest. it turns out she knew Colley through a family connection. Small world, eh?

i’ve lost count of the number of inquiries the BBC has already held into Savile-related scandals. Four, is it? Five? Don’t worry if you missed any, there’ll be another one along in a minute.

Dame Janet isn’t finished yet. She says this report is merely a ‘draft’. The lawyers are having a field day. nice work if you can get it.

And that’s before the Goddard inquiry, into ‘historic’ sex abuse everywhere from the Church to the Civil Service, has begun in earnest. once that’s in full swing it will last for years and make the £200 million Bloody Sunday circus look like money well spent.

yet the police inquiry which sparked Goddard — operation Midland — and absurdly snared lord Bramall, leon Brittan and edward Heath, among others, is utterly discredited and about to be disbanded.

Bizarrely, the investigation into Heath is still running. Cashstrapped Wiltshire Police is spending a year — and £4.5 million — combing his private papers for something to pin on his corpse.

The post- Savile ‘ historic’ sex crimes investigations have produced some crucial convictions — Stuart Hall and Rolf Harris among them — which must come as a great comfort to their victims.

But the medieval witch-hunts which have accompanied genuine cases have destroyed lives and reputations.

BBC boss Tony Hall has rightly apologised to those Savile preyed upon. But no one is apologising to the victims of false accusations. Met commissioner Bernard Hyphen-Howe refuses arrogantly to say sorry to those innocent men, such as lord Bramall and Paul Gambaccini, who have been put through hell by Scotland yard’s sex crimes stasi.

Right from the beginning, i have argued that the real scandal has been the way in which those wrongly accused of appalling crimes have been presumed guilty unless they can prove their innocence — an outrageous inversion of the basic principle of British justice.

Tony Blackburn says he will sue the BBC to clear his name. But, in the current climate, how can he ever expect to do that beyond a reasonable doubt?

All the witnesses who could prove his innocence are, like Jimmy Savile, still dead.