Lord Birt also commented on the ongoing review of BBC chairman Richard Sharp, who is facing calls to resign over his role in helping former prime minister Boris Johnson secure an £800,000 loan facility. Lord Birt argued that Sharp’s appointment should not stand and that the appointment process was fatally flawed.
During the same committee meeting, Lord Patten, the former chairman of the BBC Trust, stated that he would find it “very difficult” to defend the BBC’s impartiality rules currently if he was in Sharp’s position. He praised the current director-general Tim Davie as a “terrific guy” who would handle the situation “very well”, but questioned how his chairman was assisting him.
