Huw Edwards should return the salary he was paid by the BBC after being arrested, the culture secretary, Lisa Nandy, has said.
Nandy said it was “wrong” that the disgraced presenter had continued to receive his salary between being secretly arrested last November and his eventual resignation in April – a sum of approximately £200,000.
Speaking at the Paris Olympics on Friday, two days after Edwards pleaded guilty to accessing indecent images of abuse of children as young as seven, Nandy said: “I think he ought to return his salary.
“I think having been arrested on such serious charges all the way back in November, to continue to receive that salary all the way through until he resigned is wrong and it’s not a good use of taxpayers’ money.
“I think most people in the country will agree with that, but whether he does that or not is up to him,” she told Sky News.
Nandy spoke to the BBC director general, Tim Davie, on Thursday after Edwards’ guilty pleas – described by the minister as a “very robust and frank” discussion – amid ongoing questions over the broadcaster’s handling of the affair.
Davie has faced intense scrutiny over the BBC’s decision to keep paying the presenter, even after being informed by police of the arrest. He has said he did not previously know the full details, including the ages of the victims, although the broadcaster was aware that the allegations included category A images, the most serious level of abuse.
He has said he will “look at options” to claw back the money, but said doing so would be “very difficult … nigh on impossible”.
The BBC has not disclosed the results of an internal investigation into Edwards’ conduct within the BBC and its own handling of the initial complaint against the newsreader, made by the family of a 17-year-old who later went to the Sun newspaper in July 2023 after they felt they had not been taken seriously.
Edwards was then suspended but received a £40,000 pay rise in 2023-4, taking his salary to £475,000.
Citing “privacy and fairness to all concerned”, the broadcaster said on Friday it would not comment in detail on the Edwards case but said it had “considered carefully all issues raised with us as part of a fact-finding disciplinary investigation and that informed a confidential disciplinary process”, during which Edwards had chosen to resign.
The Guardian understands the initial fact-finding investigation concluded in late 2023.
In a separate interview with BBC News, Nandy appeared to suggest that some of the investigation’s findings should be made public, saying: “I think we all recognise there is a job of work to do, to get more information in the public domain, to reassure people, not just about the decisions that have been made but also about the action that the BBC will take going forwards.
“My concern is to make sure warning signs are caught, complaints are acted on, that public money is used well, and to make sure as far as is humanly possible that we don’t have a repeat of this situation in the future.”
Two whistleblowers who gave evidence to the internal inquiry have this week criticised its handling. One former BBC staff member who had reported Edwards for sending suggestive messages and a photo of his hotel room while covering Prince Philip’s funeral said he felt “things have been swept under the carpet”.
The BBC said: “We fully appreciate the complexities and confidentiality of [the internal investigation] can be frustrating for those who have come forward … but we are extremely grateful to everyone who did so and will always listen with great care to anyone who wants to raise concerns with us.”
