BBC chief asks Neil, scourge of woke brigade, to return
Tim Davie asks veteran interviewer to come back in latest move to shake off claims of Left-wing bias
THE BBC’s new director-general is trying to woo back Andrew Neil, as he tries to shake off allegations of Leftwing political bias.
The Sunday Telegraph can disclose that Tim Davie spent the second day in his new job on a Zoom video call with Neil trying to persuade hin to return.
Neil, regarded as television’s most forensic and feared political interviewer, left the BBC in March.
Widely seen as an antidote to the socalled “woke brigade” which is accused of cultural and political domination at the BBC, executives under the previous regime of Lord Hall had allowed his contract to lapse. But having been ignored by the corporation for almost six months – friends of Neil called his treatment “insulting” – Mr Davie has made overtures to lure him back.
It is understood he spoke to Neil in the summer to open discussions before making a series of formal offers on Wednesday in a Zoom call.
Sources close to the director-general said: “Tim Davie wants Andrew Neil back at the BBC because he is a b----good broadcaster. There has always been a collective desire to have him in the fold because of his talent.”
Neil, 71, has spent much of his time in France since The Andrew Neil Show was taken off air as a result of the pandemic, and the impossibility of grilling politicians face to face. It was formally axed in the summer.
Neil, who is chairman of The Spectator magazine and former editor of The
Sunday Times, has been accused by Left-wing commentators of “relentless sympathy for Brexit and denunciation of its critics” in posts on his Twitter feed. He previously described The
Mash Report, the BBC Two satirical show, as “self-satisfied, self-adulatory, unchallenged Left-wing propaganda”.
However, even his biggest critics recognise he is a “formidable political interviewer”.
The decision by Mr Davie to contact Neil so quickly demonstrates his serious intent to end criticism of the corporation, levelled by the Government and Tory backbenchers, of Left-wing bias.
In a speech to staff on Thursday, Mr Davie put a “renewed commitment” to impartiality centre stage, and warned anybody who wished to be an “opinionated columnist or partisan campaigner on social media” that they “should not be working at the BBC”. Sources close to him have made it known he wants the BBC to reach out to “Brexit Britain” over concern the corporation no longer held appeal for much of the UK population.
Mr Davie wants more “diverse” voices on the main television channels, and recognises that Neil is one of those. The corporation has let it be known that satirical comedy programmes, with a perceived Left-wing bias, face the axe.
Neil, who is prolific on Twitter, has promised to curb his social media activity if the BBC rehire him, and has backed Mr Davie’s impartiality push.
However, Neil is understood to be mulling over more lucrative offers from other broadcasters, and executives from commercial rivals have even travelled to France for talks with him.
In the last election, Neil demolished Jeremy Corbyn in a searing interview, while Boris Johnson preferred to be branded a coward than face Neil.