The chair of the Commons culture, media and sport committee, Caroline Dinenage, has denied writing an excoriating article that appeared under her name on the ConservativeHome website, accusing the BBC of institutional bias and deep anti-Israel bias.
The article, published in November, came amid a media storm that led to the resignations of BBC director general Tim Davie and head of news Deborah Turness after accusations of bias by former external adviser Michael Prescott.
Dinenage was questioned about the article by the BeebWatch podcast, hosted by former BBC Radio 4 presenter Roger Bolton. However, before the episode was released, Dinenage's office contacted the podcast to say that neither she nor her team had written the article and that it did not accurately reflect her views.
Bolton said: 'The article was strong stuff coming from the supposedly independent chair of a committee helping to decide on the BBC's future, so naturally I raised these statements with Ms Dinenage in our interview. We had a vigorous discussion in which she did not question the article's authenticity, and I challenged her suggestion of institutional bias in particular. However, shortly after we had recorded the interview, her office contacted us to say that Caroline Dinenage had not written the article, nor had anyone in her office, and that she did not hold some of the beliefs attributed to her.'
The section of the podcast discussing the article was subsequently edited out. ConservativeHome stated that it could not find a record of who sent them the article but believed it to be genuine and sent in good faith, and it remains on the website.
The incident highlights the process of drafting opinion pieces under a politician's name, often written by media officers and approved by the politician. In this case, a misunderstanding may have occurred over whether Dinenage approved the piece, though the original author remains unknown.
Bolton remarked: 'Given this disputed authenticity, we reluctantly decided to edit out that part of the discussion relating to the controversial article. There seem to be only two possibilities. Ms Dinenage or her office did write the article. Someone pretending to be her wrote it. Whatever the truth, it has remained on the ConservativeHome website for several months without anyone apparently noticing. It is still there to be read. Altogether a rum affair.'
