The BBC deemed Bob Vylan “high risk” before their controversial Glastonbury set, director-general Tim Davie has said.
The punk duo led a chant of “death, death to the IDF [Israel Defence Forces]” during their set, which was available to watch via a live stream on iPlayer on Saturday.
Director-general Tim Davie has said the corporation is taking action to “ensure proper accountability” for those found to be responsible for the broadcast.
BBC News understands that a number of staff have been moved off their day-to-day duties from the music and live events team.
BBC chair Samir Shah said the decision not to pull the live feed was “unquestionably an error of judgement”.
In a statement, Davie said he “deeply regrets that such offensive and deplorable behaviour appeared on the BBC and want to apologise to our viewers and listeners and in particular the Jewish community”.
Davie said Bob Vylan had been “deemed high risk following a risk assessment process applied to all acts appearing at Glastonbury”.
“Seven acts including Bob Vylan were included in this category and they were all deemed suitable for live streaming with appropriate mitigations.”
He continued: “Prior to Glastonbury, a decision was taken that compliance risks could be mitigated in real time on the live stream – through the use of language or content warnings – without the need for a delay. This was clearly not the case.”
“During the performance, the livestream was monitored in line with the agreed compliance protocols and a number of issues were escalated. Warnings appeared on the stream on two occasions and the editorial team took the decision not to cut the feed. This was an error.”
“The Director-General was subsequently made aware of what had happened and instructed the team that none of the performance should feature in further coverage.”
Davie said the team prioritised stopping the performance from becoming available on demand, meaning that the set would not appear on iPlayer or BBC Sounds.
However, the live feed remained available for several hours, meaning viewers were able to rewind and view the content.
“Given the failings that have been acknowledged we are taking actions to ensure proper accountability for those found to be responsible for those failings in the live broadcast. We will not comment further on those processes at this time.”
Davie also said the BBC would be making “immediate changes to livestreaming music events”.
These would, he said, include:
- Any music performances deemed high risk by the BBC will now not be broadcast live or streamed live
- The corporation’s Editorial Policy unit will always be available on site at major music festivals and events, to improve compliance processes and the speed of available advice
- The BBC will provide more detailed, practical guidance on the threshold for withdrawing a live stream.
In a statement, BBC chair Samir Shah apologised “to all our viewers and listeners and particularly the Jewish community for allowing the ‘artist’ Bob Vylan to express unconscionable antisemitic views live on the BBC”.
“This was unquestionably an error of judgement. I was very pleased to note that as soon as this came to the notice of Tim Davie – who was on the Glastonbury site at the time visiting BBC staff – he took immediate action and instructed the team to withdraw the performance from on demand coverage.”
