Eventually I got back to my office at Broadcasting House to discover that what had happened at Television Centre was not a one-off. All over the country the staff had taken to the streets to protest that their boss was leaving. In Cardiff, Glasgow, Belfast, Manchester, Newcastle, and Birmingham hundreds had walked out to protest. But it wasn’t only in the big centres. The staff of local radio stations had also left their offices. At BBC Radio Shropshire in Shrewsbury all the staff had walked out, including the presenter who was on air. He had gone outside to express solidarity, whilst rightly continuing to broadcast live to the people of Shropshire.
In the next few days more than six thousand staff replied to my e-mail wishing me luck, thanking me for what I had done during my time at the BBC, and telling me how much they would miss me. I have chosen two examples – one from a producer in the World Service, and one from News; but there were thousands like them. The first said:
Your greatest achievement was giving the kiss of life to a body of people who’d been systematically throttled, castrated and lobotomised. To leave us all very much alive and kicking, loving the BBC and respecting the role of Director General again, is a fantastic legacy.
And the second:
The only way I can come to terms with the extraordinary events of the last 48 hours is to pay testimony to the vision and energy you have brought to the BBC. Men and women, even journalists, cried today. People came together and talked about their emotions, their fears, their frustrations all because the man who had embodied the hope, the vision, the pride they had begun to feel about the future of the organization had gone.
They came from all parts of the BBC and at all levels, all thanking me for changing the BBC. Well, all bar one. Amongst this great pile of e-mails my staff sifted out the only negative communication. It simply said:
Fuck off Dyke, I’m glad you are going, I never liked you anyway.
That same night some of the staff in Factual Programmes and Current Affairs began collecting money to pay for an advertisement in the Daily Telegraph to express their support. In twenty-four hours they collected twice as much as they needed, with all sorts of people contributing right across the BBC, from the lowest paid to the highest. Even people in the canteen who didn’t work for the BBC, and who earned very little money, contributed. The spare money, nearly £10,000, was given to a charity of my choice. The Telegraph carried a full-page advertisement with a heading ‘The Independence of the BBC’ followed by a paragraph explaining that it had been paid for by BBC staff. It then said:
Greg Dyke stood for brave, independent and rigorous BBC journalism that was fearless in its search for the truth. We are resolute that the BBC should not step back from its determination to investigate the facts in pursuit of the truth.
Through his passion and integrity Greg inspired us to make programmes of the highest quality and creativity.
We are dismayed by Greg’s departure, but we are determined to maintain his achievements and his vision for an independent organization that serves the public above all else.
The page included just some of the thousands of names of BBC staff who had paid for the advertisement. They couldn’t get all the names on the page. When I read it, I think it was the only time during the whole saga that I broke down and cried.
As I left Broadcasting House for the final time it seemed like everyone working there had come down to cheer me off. My own office staff all came out to the car: Fiona, Emma, Magnus, Orla, and Cheryl were all there to wave me goodbye, plus virtually the whole of the marketing department. I did a couple more quick interviews and in the middle of being interviewed live on Sky News my mobile phone rang. I answered it to find David Frost on the other end, so I offered him the opportunity to speak live to the world on Sky News. I don’t think he quite understood what was happening.
And then I was gone. Four years to the very day that I had become Director-General I was driven away for the last time.
That evening Sue (who had driven back from Suffolk just for the night), Joe, and I went out for dinner. I think we were all on a strange high, laughing and joking. We ended up round the corner with our good friends John Stapleton and Lynn Faulds Wood, where I promised to do a live phone interview for John’s early morning programme on GMTV the following day. I decided then that I would only do three interviews: with John, because he’s a good friend; with the Today programme the following morning, when I could put on record what I was feeling; and with David Frost on Sunday, again repaying the support and friendship that he and his wife Carina had shown Sue and me over the years.
For the Today interview, which I fixed up at about four in the morning, I suggested they send the radio car round to my house. When they turned up a BBC News television crew was already there so I thought I’d make everyone a cup of tea. It is ironic that, after three days of avoiding journalists and news crews outside the house, the pictures of me carrying out the tea for the crews is one of the memorable shots of the whole affair. Virtually everyone I know saw it and mentions it when we meet. I also know that the pictures caused great consternation inside 10 Downing Street. Who says there’s no such thing as news management?
It was three days before I began to realize that perhaps all was not as it had seemed to be. The idea came to me when I was talking to someone from within the BBC who told me that she believed some of the Governors had been out to get me regardless of Hutton. It got me thinking: did some of the Governors have another agenda?
By then I knew that three of the eleven Governors had supported me in the crunch vote: the ballet dancer Deborah Bull, the Oxford academic Ruth Deech and voluntary sector consultant Angela Sarkis were all against my leaving. They were the three Governors who had most recently joined the Board. The ‘posh ladies’ had both been against me and Sarah Hogg, in particular, had led the charge. She had told the Board that she had never liked me.
I was surprised when I discovered that I had not received any support from the Governors representing Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and the English regions. If I had achieved one thing in my time at the BBC it was to increase investment and improve morale outside of London, and yet when the crunch came the Governors with particular responsibility for the Nations and Regions had all voted against me.
Not that they were ever the strongest of Governors. Three of them – Ranjit Sondhi, Fabian Monds, and Merfyn Jones – had said very little over the years. It always seemed to me that they were intimidated by the posh ladies. In the case of Ranjit, I understand he was in real trouble when he got home. His wife, Anita Bhalla, who works for the BBC as Head of Political and Community Affairs for the English Regions, was a big Dyke supporter and, reportedly, tore him to shreds for going along with the decision. Ranjit was a really likeable, incredibly hard-working Governor, but he was never likely to rock the boat about anything.
Only Robert Smith, an accountant and business leader from Scotland, had played a significant role at Governors’ meetings in my time, and it was always difficult to judge where he was coming from. At that time we all knew he was after a big new job as chairman of a major public company, and like so many accountants he loved to look tough if the opportunity presented itself.
I began to think about the conversation Gavyn, Pauline Neville-Jones, and I had had the night before Hutton was published. Surely if Pauline had said that she thought it was impossible for Gavyn and me to leave at the same time, shouldn’t she have been arguing on my behalf, given that Gavyn had already gone? And yet she hadn’t stood up for me and had in fact voted the other way. I began to think some more.
Pauline Neville-Jones had always been a big supporter of Mark Byford. As the Governor with special responsibility for the World Service she had worked closely with him and clearly rated him highly. I suspect she also liked him because, like most of the BBC lifers, he was better at the politics of dealing with the Governors, better at playing the game of being respectful. It was a game that I refused to play. I saw no reason why I should treat the Governors any differently from the way I treated everyone else. I certainly wasn’t going to regard the earth they walked on as if it was somehow holy ground. This wasn’t a wilful decision. It was just the way I am.
After